The Morning Star's Heir
by Siavahda
Summary: Clary really isn't like other girls: she's never met her mother, she can smell what you had for dinner last night, and the presence of other women makes her see red. Then there's her dad, Joscelin, who cares more about her Parkour and her Krav Maga than her GPA, and her boyfriend Simon, who's also her submissive. But if she thinks she's strange now... Simon/Clary/Jace poly fic.
1. Prologue

This is...very far from canon, my dears. We have Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics, a polyamorous relationship in the works (this is a Jace/Clary/Simon fic), and pretty much everyone is either racebent or genderbent. A lot of characters are both. If that's not your thing, there's the back button!

On top of that, the Nephilim in this story look very, very different to Cassandra Clare's ones. You have been warned.

That said, I hope you enjoy the fic!

**Summary**: Clary really isn't like other girls: she's never met her mother, she can smell what you had for dinner last night, and the presence of other women makes her see red. Then there's her dad, Joscelin, who cares more about her Parkour and her Krav Maga than her GPA, and her boyfriend Simon, who's also her submissive. Not exactly traditional relationships for a seventeen year old girl.

She thinks her life is strange now. It's about to get a whole lot weirder. Clary/Simon, Magnus/Alec, Luke/Joscelin, eventual Jace/Clary/Simon.

* * *

**Prologue**

It's like this:

Simon is Clary's. To the bone, incontrovertibly and irrevocably _hers._

It's something they've both known since they were five years old, when Clary chased off Mary Jane from down the street by planting a handprint in blue paint on Simon's cheek and fiercely declaring, _"Mine."_ Between the low growl and the patented Fray glare, MJ stalked off in a huff, and Clary's smug smile lasted the whole week.

Simon, of course, accepted the claim without question. Even when they were nine and Clary gave Gary Dowers a black eye because he'd tried to steal Simon's lunch money, Simon just sat back and let Clary handle it. The pattern was already well-established by then.

Neither of them noticed Clary's dad and Luke exchange the occasional worried glance over Clary's protectiveness—or connected those looks to Joscelin's decision to pull Clary out of school a few months after the lunch money incident.

Since he convinced Mrs Lewis to home-school Simon, too, what did Clary and Simon care?

By the time they were fourteen it had evolved into outright territoriality, with Clary circling Simon like a stallion around a mare, driving off any potential competition. Boys were all right—Clary graciously allowed Kirk, then sporting a neatly trimmed afro, into Simon's reach, and later Matt and Eric, who were a package deal; the one a quiet white boy with a surprisingly wry tongue, and the other a gamer of Mediterranean descent who bonded with Simon over World of Warcraft. She knifed each of them with a single piercing, all-seeing stare, before finally nodding regal acceptance: yes, they were good enough to be friends with her Simon. But girls? Any and all girls who approached Simon were summarily driven off without mercy. Frosty rudeness, wicked pranks, and when necessary physical violence sufficed to make sure that the female population of the neighbourhood received the message loud and clear: leave Simon Lewis alone, because Clary didn't share.

After a particularly vicious catfight, Joscelin sat his daughter down for a Talk—and got precisely nowhere.

"Simon's happy, isn't he?" Clary demanded. "He's healthy, he gets good grades—who says anything's wrong?"

She bristled at the suggestion that she wasn't taking good care of her Simon—because of course _she _was the one who had made him stop buying Mars bars and eat apples instead, and _she_ was the one who made sure his homework got done when he and the other boys wanted to play video games, and Joscelin put his head in his hands and groaned.

"Clary, you can't keep Simon from making friends…" He tried. But his own voice was uncertain, and Clary huffed, not convinced in the least.

"He _has_ friends," she pointed out. Which was true. There was Kirk and Matt and Eric, who were stupid boys but a little less stupid than most, since they liked Simon and that was a sign of good taste, as far as Clary was concerned. They weren't _hers_, not like Simon was, but they were acceptable.

"But no girlfriends—friends-who-are-girls," Joscelin clarified hurriedly when Clary's eyes narrowed. "Can't he hang out with girls, too, if he wants?"

And Clary said simply, "No."

And that was that.

)0(

When they're sixteen, Simon comes out as bi by admitting that he likes Spike the same way he likes Buffy.

It makes Clary pause, and consider. "I don't think I'm like that," she says finally. She feels vaguely annoyed, as if Simon's managed to one-up her.

He raises his eyebrows at her. "What about Storm?"

"Well, yeah, for _Storm_ I'd turn bi in a white-hot second," Clary says, because _obviously_, does he even have to ask? "But I don't think I like most girls."

"I hadn't noticed," he says dryly, and she grins at him, unrepentant.

She kisses him a week later. They're in her room and they both taste of ice-cream, because it's summer and too hot to do _anything_ but eat ice-cream, but Simon's lips are cool and perfect, and they part under hers when she runs the tip of her tongue over them. The way he shudders against her makes something hot and molten coil in the pit of her stomach, makes her fingers curl tightly in the fabric of his shirt.

His mouth is sweet like cookie-dough.

)0(

After that first kiss, they learn fast that Clary doesn't like what the girls in the romance movies like. Simon tries, clumsily and uncertainly, to take charge, the way the whole world says he's supposed to, and Clary tries to let him, but it just doesn't work; it leaves her body numb and her mind starts drifting to her Chemistry homework when Simon's trying to be macho or whatever.

She can tell he doesn't like it either. Not the way he likes her hands in his hair, bending his head back so she can suck at his throat. He never whimpers like he does when she pins his wrists to the mattress and kisses him slowly, like torture, lapping at his mouth until his lips are wet and swollen and he can hardly breathe. When he tries to give her a love-bite, the small, sharp pain makes her want to swat him; whereas he gets hard when she has her teeth in his neck.

They give it up after a couple of weeks and just do what feels good instead.

Sometimes it makes Clary wonder what's wrong with her, that she wants this. Wants it _like_ this. She knows other girls like their boyfriends to be just a little bit possessive, to carry their bags and kiss them with their backs against a wall, but it just doesn't work for her. Other girls fantasise about their boyfriends getting down on their knees to propose; Clary imagines the look in his eyes if, while he was down there, she pulled his face between her legs and ordered him to use his tongue.

No one in the books or comics she and Simon read or in the movies they watch wants what she does. But Simon likes it, so what does it matter if she's the one on top? Who cares?

She wears a skirt without panties, and puts him on his knees, and watches his face as she spreads her legs.

)0(

Her plan is to have sex-sex—penis-in-vagina, hetero-normative, God-approved sex—on her seventeenth birthday. There's no real reason for it—by the time they both feel ready to go all the way, it's just a few weeks until the big day and they might as well wait a little longer. It can be her birthday present.

His fingers and mouth are pretty epic consolation for waiting, anyway.

But then Pandemonium happens, and pandemonium breaks loose.

Because she looks at Jace and thinks, _mine._


	2. Chapter One - Awaken to the Night

**Chapter One**  
**Awaken the Night**

Had anyone glanced up at just that moment, they would have seen the quick, darting forms of two flying shadows soaring from one rooftop to the next.

Clary dropped onto the lower roof and fell seamlessly into a perfect roll, springing up to her feet again before Simon had even landed. She heard him hit the tiles behind her but didn't stop to watch; she sprung ahead with a two-handed vault over a chimney stack, her legs scissoring wide and then snapping together as she landed at a run. The wind tugged at her ponytail, and she could feel Simon catch up to her, his long legs eating up the distance until they were side-by-side again, the way they were meant to be, as synchronised as heartbeats.

The roof ended and they flew again, taking off hard with practised leaps. Clary tucked her legs in under her as Simon front-flipped forward, showing off; he turned head-over-heels twice and landed on his feet on the other side, only just touching down before dissolving into a perfect Parkour roll to absorb the impact, right shoulder to left hip and snapping upright again. Clary's palms touched down first, slapping against the concrete; she pushed off from it and front-flipped, twisting mid-air and landing lightly on the soles of her sneakers, cat-like, elastic.

Ahead of her, Simon kicked off the ground and up into the air, corkscrewing his body parallel with the ground as he passed over a low wall, arms by his sides. With a laugh, Clary precision-jumped, springing with both legs together and landing on top of the wall. She used the momentum to keep going, immediately leaping again down onto the level and running after her boyfriend. He was a few yards in the lead now, pulling a wall pass; he ran vertically up the next wall, snatching at the top of it to haul himself over and out of her sight, smooth as Spiderman.

_I don't think so!_

Her sneakers slapped against the ground as she pushed off, launching herself upwards after him as if she were winged. Her fingers found the ledge and she turned it into a forward roll, unfolding cat-like to her feet. Simon was already halfway across the level by then, gearing up to drop back down.

He never saw her coming.

She tackled him, hard; his breath _whooshed_ from his chest as they hit the concrete together, tumbling over and under each other in a blurring whirl of thrilling gravity. She heard him laugh right before she caught his shoulders and shoved them down, pinning him flat against the ground.

Simon melted; the moment she pushed he turned boneless, unresisting, and it sent bright heat searing down Clary's spine, feeling him give himself up to her without hesitation. A purr caught in her throat, and she watched his pupils grow swollen as she stroked her hands down his arms, skimming her nails lightly over his tawny skin until he shivered.

"Clary…"

"Mm?" She closed her hands around his wrists, firmly, and smirked at the soft, helpless sound he made.

"Please kiss me," he pleaded, and she purred outright, leaning forward to bring her mouth over his.

"Begging already," she breathed, smug. "Are you all wound up, Simon?" She kissed the corner of his lips, lightly, softly. Revelling in the needy whimper that spilled out of his throat. "Thinking about tonight?"

He groaned softly, tipping his head back helplessly. She didn't need him to answer—straddling his hips, she could feel his growing hardness—but she wanted to hear him say it. Wanted to know he was thinking about it, unable to get it out of his mind.

She rolled her hips against his, gently grinding his arousal against her ache. Briefly letting go of his wrists, she pulled the hairband from her ponytail, shaking her black hair so that it tumbled down around her shoulders.

"Yes!" Simon gasped, "Yes, of course I am—I haven't thought about anything else for _days_—"

"What a coincidence," Clary murmured. "Neither have I." Abruptly she caught and pushed his hands above his head, holding them there; the effort arched her body over his, curving her spine, and she nuzzled his jaw, dragging her teeth over the bone. Her hair fell around them like a curtain, mingling with his own dark chocolate tresses, and Simon groaned as it brushed his cheek.

"Oh God," he whispered, biting his lip.

She purred and nipped his neck, trailing her lips down to his pulse. The _scent_ of him—it drove her unutterably insane, a perfume that demanded she seek its source, kiss and bite and taste it, _mark_ it. She'd long since found the exact spot on his throat that emanated the maddening, delicious aroma, the curve where his neck met his shoulder, and it was a rare day when that particular inch of skin wasn't mottled blue and violet from her teeth. It called to her, again and again, with that scent that grew stronger the faster Simon's heart pounded; like woodsmoke and fresh-cut grass and baking cookies, vanilla and coconut and autumn leaves, and nothing like any of them. Nothing got her hotter faster than breathing it in.

No one else smelled like Simon. Every other guy she'd ever met smelled like plastic and sweat and whatever they'd had for lunch—but beneath that there was nothing; they had no scent of their own, as if they weren't real. Her dad and Luke and Simon were the only ones who smelled real—and of them, only Simon drew her in like this.

She licked his scent-spot, and felt him swallow hard. "Have you been imagining it, Simon?" She rolled her hips harder over him, grinding his arousal right where she wanted it—and he _whined_, pushing up into her desperately because he could feel it, couldn't he, the slick heat of her spread open right over his cock, only their thin sweats keeping skin from skin— "What it'll feel like when I sink down onto you, take you into me?"

"Yes," he whispered.

She leaned up and kissed him hard in reward. His lips opened under hers, welcoming her in eagerly, his tongue pleading for hers. She slid into him, stroking his mouth until he was trembling under her, every muscle taut with the need to touch her.

That he couldn't—because she held him down, because he let her—set her blood on fire.

"Maybe you shouldn't be looking forward to it," she murmured against his mouth. Deliberately squirming over his hips—he moaned, the sound almost one of pain—she adjusted her grip on his wrists so she was holding him down one-handed. "I haven't decided yet if I'm going to let you touch me." She slid her freed hand down his chest, thumbing his nipple through his thin workout shirt. "Imagine _that_ for me, pet: your hands tied behind your back while I ride you. Having to watch me, feel me, but unable to touch me as I use you…"

He moaned, straining against her hold—but not hard enough to break free; only enough to feel the pressure of her holding him down. "You'd kill me," he gasped, breathing so fast, so hard, that maddening _scent _spilling from his throat. "Oh God, I couldn't take it—I'd go _insane_—"

Clary paused, pretending to consider. "You're right," she decided. And smirked, nipping Simon's lower lip gently. "I should blindfold you too."

Simon _whimpered_, a sweetness that jolted straight down between Clary's legs and smouldered there, molten and wet.

"You can picture it, can't you?" she breathed, brushing her lips over his ear. Her fingertips stroked a line over his hipbones—and slid under the waistband of her sweats.

He jerked, panting, shivering, his pupils blown. "Are you—?"

"Mmhm."

His head fell back. _"Fuck."_

"Picture it, Simon," she murmured, and he whimpered again as she stroked herself, the fabric of their trousers so thin her knuckles pressed and rolled against his cock with every minute movement. "If you couldn't touch me, couldn't see me—if all you could do was feel me take you, bit by bit until I had all of you in me…" She was so wet; she shifted a little, pressing the bulk of his arousal against the throbbing ache, torturing herself as well as him. She ground against it, panting herself now, her fingers moving faster over her clit as she pictured it. She could almost feel what it would be like—the desperate, needy sounds Simon would make, not so different from the ones he was making now, but with the added pleasure of _finally _fucking him, finally filling that hungry warm ache— "Feeling me start to ride you, so slowly—using you, and you'd feel so good in me, Simon, make me feel so good—"

She kissed his cheek. "You want to make me feel good, don't you?" she breathed, rocking against him.

"Yes," he gasped, "God, yes, Clary, _Clary_—" He was almost, almost sobbing, breathless and incredible and _hers_, hers to the bone. "Anything, anything you want—"

"Good boy," she moaned, panting, nuzzling his jaw, "such a good boy, Simon—so good, all mine—"

She fell against his mouth as she came, kissing him hard and messy, tasting his frantic need as she rocked, shuddering with the diamond-lightning flash of her orgasm. She let go of his wrists and his arms came up around her, holding her, stroking her through it and he was kissing her, kissing and kissing her, her good boy, her Simon.

"I love you," she sighed as the aftershocks rippled through her. She snuggled into his chest, tucking her head beneath his chin. "Gods, I love you so fucking much."

"I love you too," he whispered. She felt him kiss her hair. He was still breathing hard, his cock a delicious hardness against her lower belly. "More than anything."

Lazily, Clary nuzzled his scent-spot. Licked it. He shuddered. "Do you want to come?" she murmured.

He trembled against her. "Yes," he whispered.

She shifted against him, raising herself up. With a single fingertip, she tipped his face up to hers. "Then beg me for it," she breathed against his lips.

He did.

)0(

When they had both recovered, they made their way back to the Fray residence over the rooftops, taking it easier than they had on the outward journey. There was no need to push muscles still a little soft and rubbery from the afterglow.

Joscelin was standing in Clary's room when she swung down through the window, staring at his watch. "What time do you call this?"

Clary landed in a crouch and rolled out of the way, making room for Simon to swing in after her. "It's not nine yet," she protested.

Simon straightened up beside her. "Hi Mr Fray," he said shyly.

Joscelin rolled his eyes—Simon's refusal to use Joscelin's first name was a long-running argument. "Good morning, Simon." He returned his attention to Clary. "That route is supposed to take you thirty minutes. You've been gone over an hour. If you're slacking—"

Clary raised one eyebrow. "Dad, no."

He stopped mid-rant. "Excuse me?"

"We weren't slacking." She grinned. "We just stopped for…bagels."

"Bagels?"

Clary nodded mock-solemnly. "Yes. Bagels."

Joscelin glanced from his daughter's innocence to Simon's blush. "I'm sure," he said dryly. "I hope you used protection for your bagels, at least."

Simon's flush worsened.

"Yep," Clary said cheerfully. "We had napkins and everything."

Simon looked as if he were in danger of choking.

Joscelin sighed and waved his hand, dismissing them. "Fine, fine. But tomorrow, stick to your time, okay? I don't want you getting soft."

Clary touched two fingers to her temple and saluted him. "Sir, yes sir!"

Her father rolled his eyes again and headed for the door. "Both of you get cleaned up and ready for Trig," he said over his shoulder.

"Trig on my birthday?" Clary demanded. "That's just cruel and unusual punishment!"

"And separate showers!" Joscelin called. "You can use mine, Lewis!"

Clary grinned and pecked her boyfriend on the lips. "You heard the man, dear," she said. "Get to it."

She didn't have to look to know that he watched her leave. The play on the rooftop had taken the edge off, but they were both hungry for tonight.

)0(

"Morning, kiddo," Luke said when Clary emerged from her bedroom. "You want coffee?"

"When in my life have I ever turned down caffeine?" she asked the ceiling, dropping down into her usual chair. Simon already had his books open, frowning adorably as his pencil moved over the page, muttering to himself under his breath.

"You're seventeen now; who knows what strange thing you'll try next?" Luke set her mug down beside her. "Happy birthday, sweetheart."

"Thanks." She kissed his scruffy cheek, inhaling his familiar scent. "Shouldn't you be at the store by now, though?"

Luke glanced over at Joscelin, grinning. "I would have been, but somebody kept me up late last night."

Joscelin ducked his head, blushing almost as badly as Simon would have done. It never stopped being hilarious that her father, who was stoic on every other topic, grew so flustered about sex.

"Don't complain—if he were gone your dad would have to make breakfast," Simon said without looking up. He ducked Joscelin's playful swipe without needing to see it.

"Ungrateful wretches," Joscelin declared, heading for the coffee machine. "I wash my hands of all of you."

Laughing, Luke darted over and caught Joscelin by the waist, spinning them back-to-chest. "Not all of us, I hope," he teased in a low murmur, dropping a kiss on his lover's neck.

Joscelin muttered something Clary couldn't hear, his dark skin helping to hide his blush. Clary grinned, dropping her eyes to give them a modicum of privacy.

She couldn't remember a time her father's petrichor-cedarwood-bamboo scent hadn't carried traces of Luke's old books-steel-coffee smell, and vice versa. For as long as she had memory Luke had been her second father, there on her first day of school (and her last), there to take her to the zoo and the library and put band-aids on her scrapes. She had thought that everyone's second parent went away at bedtime after reading the night's story, and came back the next day to cook breakfast.

She hadn't understood that Luke wasn't actually related to her until Joscelin explained, but even a seven year old couldn't miss what her dad and Luke meant to each other. She'd known _that_ long before Joscelin extended his boyfriend a permanent invitation to stay the night.

'_I'm seven, not stupid!'_ she'd announced at the time, to Joscelin's bemusement and Luke's laughter.

She still wasn't stupid, could still see that they fit perfectly together. Her dad had a swimmer's build, his muscles toned without mass, lithe and slender, with terra-cotta skin and the most incredible hair, black as night and fine as silk, that he kept forgetting to cut. Luke was more muscular, taller, his skin a few shades lighter and his dark hair cut shorter than Joscelin's, his jaw stubbled where Joscelin was always smooth-shaven, and on the bad days—the days when Clary's father had white knuckles and white lips and dark eyes, his shoulders hard and tense as wood—Luke was the only one who could make him laugh again.

But today wasn't one of the bad days. Today there were pancakes, and her dads kissing over coffee, and annoying Trigonometry. There was Simon's bare foot pressed against hers, and the shadow of her teeth just visible over the neck of his shirt, and the warm, fizzing anticipation of the coming night. How was she supposed to focus on her exercises when all she could think about was what Simon would look like, sound like, feel like when they finally went all the way?

Luke left to tend to his book store, promising to be back for the birthday celebrations. Joscelin sat down at the table with Clary and Simon, helping them when they needed or asked for it, wandering into the spare room that had become the studio when they didn't.

Time crawled until noon, when the doorbell rang.

"I'll get it!" Clary sang, springing up from her chair all too eagerly—only for Joscelin to point her back down in her seat.

"Finish your exercise," he ordered, walking towards the door himself. But he smiled as he touched the doorknob. "Get all the answers, and it can be the last for today."

"Do we have to get answers, or the _right_ answers?" Simon asked.

"Don't be smart, Lewis," Joscelin tossed over his shoulder.

"But I thought that was the point?"

Bent over her book, Clary knew who had arrived by the scent that came breezing into the apartment with the sound of the opening door. Simon's mom was confusing, caught in the middle of the Venn diagram that existed in Clary's head, dividing 'the world' from 'family'; her scent was mostly blank, the same disturbing nothingness that was the default odour of the greater populace, but there was a flicker of _more_ in it. Beneath the synthetic, not-real smell there was a whisper of jasmine tea and citrus, so faint that Clary couldn't always pick up on it at all. It grew stronger when Mrs Lewis was emotional, but that was a bad thing, because the clearer the scent became, the more it rubbed Clary the wrong way, grating across her senses like heated sandpaper until she wanted to break something. And that sucked, because Simon's mom was awesome.

Now, for example, she came bearing cake.

"And my famous kosher bagels," Mrs Lewis declared, sweeping in to set the various baked goods on the kitchen counter—whereupon she gave Joscelin and Simon a bemused glance. "Why is she laughing?"

Neither Clary's dad nor her boyfriend wanted to explain why she'd dissolved into giggles at the sight of the bagels, so Clary got herself under control in time to thank Mrs Lewis for her efforts and birthday wishes.

The cake was excellent, which surprised precisely no one. Luke returned in time for the moist, chocolatey goodness, and if Clary licked her fingers a bit more than necessary, the look on Simon's face as he watched her lips was more than worth it.

Then it was time for presents: Mrs Lewis presented her with a giftcard to Hot Topic and a translated copy of the _Karma Sutra_ (Joscelin's cheeks flushed dark again), and the wrapping paper on Luke's gift gave way to reveal a beautiful leather-bound journal, its creamy pages alternately blank and lined for music.

The box from Simon was small enough to fit in her cupped hands.

"It's made from a New York quarter," he said when she saw the ring. "See? And it's from the year you were born." He showed her: _New York 1998_ was emblazoned on the bronze metal, clear as day.

Clary could feel her smile stretching across her face, impossible to hold in. "Put it on me?" She held out her hand to him, draping it across his fingers like a Queen awaiting her consort's kiss.

She smelled the spice of simmering desire rise from his body as he obediently slid the ring onto her middle finger, careful not to catch her skin.

She withdrew her hand and splayed her fingers, admiring it. Loving it, the small perfection of it, eccentric and sweet and wonderful. "Simon, it's _gorgeous_. Thank you!" Heedless of their audience, she flung her arms around him, squeezing tight. "I love it!"

He hugged her back. "You're so welcome."

"All right, lovebirds, it's my turn." Joscelin pushed the final present towards Clary. "This is for you."

"Is anybody else getting presents today?" Clary joked, loosening her arms from around Simon. "What is it?"

"Open it up, and you'll see."

The dark blue wrapping paper tore easily. Underneath it was a flat box of very dark wood, a little bigger than her hand with fingers outspread. It smelled _amazing_, spicy and rich, and Clay breathed it in before she noticed the elaborate carvings: every inch of the box was engraved with strange symbols like nothing she'd ever seen before. For a moment they felt familiar, but that was impossible; she would have remembered an alphabet this elegantly weird, with its elegant curlicues and hard, sharp angles…

She traced her fingertip over one, a diamond with two little horns curving from the top of it. The simple little design was so hypnotic, tugging at her; drawing it over and over again with her finger, it felt as though she were falling into it, as if the rest of the world were dissolving into silk and shadows—and in the space left behind, she thought she could hear someone singing…

"Clary?" Luke asked. "Aren't you going to open it?"

The music vanished. The world came back, and Clary blinked, startled. "Right. Sorry, it's just such a pretty box."

She lifted the lid—and gasped.

She'd thought the box was intricate, but it had nothing on the necklace inside. Resting on a bed of white velvet was a round pendant of silvery crystal, formed of two circles. The main, inner circle had an emblem of an upside-down star with what looked like a 3 and a 6 on either side of it, with a triangle above and a kind of trident below. The outer circle, like a rim around the first, flowed with swirling, curving symbols. Only the small crescent moon at the top made any sense to her.

The design wasn't engraved, but cut out of the gem as if it had been drawn with a stencil, each symbol touching the next to form a delicate lacework of crystal. It made for a more elegant effect than if it had been a solid amulet simply carved with all the little pictograms; the result was ephemeral and feminine and strong. Shining like solid starlight, it might have been the talisman of a witch or a goddess.

"Woah," Simon said, leaning over to have a look. "What is it?"

Carefully, Clary lifted it free of the box, touching it only with her fingertips and only at the edges, as if it was a developing photograph that might smudge. A thin gold chain spilled out between her fingers. "Dad…"

"It belonged to your mother," Joscelin said, and Clary's head snapped up hard, because in seventeen years they had never talked about her mother, not once. Clary had never seen a picture of her mom, didn't even know the name of the woman who had birthed her. When she was old enough to see the shadow that passed over Joscelin every time Clary asked about her, she had stopped asking.

Sure enough, her dad's face was drawn tight; his smile had a raw, hesitant edge. "I guess it would be better to say it belonged to her family," he continued, not quite meeting his daughter's eyes. "It's about time you had it."

"It's beautiful," Clary said quietly. It was. Without question, it was the most stunning piece of jewellery she had ever seen, regal and magical. The sight of it tugged at something in her, the same primal, powerful something that drove her to dominate Simon or push herself with her Parkour; she wanted it around her neck, wanted to feel it resting against her collarbone. But she hesitated.

Whoever her mother had been, the very mention of her made Joscelin lock down and hide away in his studio, and Clary had never thought that pain was grief. Her mother had hurt her dad somehow, hurt him badly enough that the mere mention of her could give him a panic attack. In fairytales, plenty of kings were left wounded when their queens died, but Clary's mother had done something worse than die. She knew it like she knew her own name.

Clary wasn't sure she wanted to wear something that had belonged to someone who hurt her dad like that.

"Did my mom ever wear it?" she asked finally, battling between her need to protect Joscelin and her aching hunger for the necklace.

But her dad shook his head. "She had another one made in gold. She thought this one was too plain."

Too plain? Clary stared, not sure how anyone could come to that conclusion. Sure, the pendant wasn't very colourful—but the crystal was soft and milky, like mist under moonlight, glimmering like a star as it spun slowly on its chain. The lines of it were simple, but graceful, smooth, lovely.

And her mother had never worn it.

That made the decision simple. She slipped the chain over her head and let the pendant settle below her throat, a cool, light weight. "In that case, thank you." She touched it gently, resisting the urge to purr with pleasure at the beautiful gift. "I love it, dad."

Her dad looked up from the grain of the table. They were so much the same, Clary thought suddenly: the same inky black hair, the same golden-brown eyes—like sand and bronze and fire—the same rich, dark skin, like ancient pottery. The same blazing temper; the same sense of humour. But seeing the vulnerable look in Joscelin's face, for the first time Clary realised that her dad had something she didn't; armour, and behind it, a softness that could be wounded.

Clary had no armour, because she had no softness to protect. She was made of something harder than what Joscelin was, something that cruel words and betrayals could not scratch.

The thought unsettled her as much as it pleased her, and after a moment she understood why: remembered a scene, when she was six or seven or eight, when she and her father were in a store together. A man was screaming abuse at Joscelin—over what, Clary couldn't remember; it could have been over a spilled shopping basket, or maybe the guy hadn't liked the look of 'those damned foreigners'—and Joscelin had stood there and taken it. Stood frozen, and silent, braced as if for a blow—until Clary, six years old (or seven, or eight) had stepped forward and snarled _'don't yell at my daddy!'_

It had shocked Joscelin out of his trance, and he had whisked them away. But that was it; that was the difference between them. Push at Clary, and she would snap back, bristling, unable to imagine backing down. Her dad would always protect _her_, would fight for _her_—she had never once doubted that—but he wouldn't fight for himself.

Had he always been like that, or had Clary's mother left that scar?

She felt a surge of protectiveness for him, her amazing dad, and reached out to touch his cheek, the way she would have if it were Simon who was hurting. He started, but didn't pull away.

"Really," Clary said softly. "I love it. Thank you."

The sore, bruised look faded from her father's eyes. "You're very welcome, Clary."

Clary took her hand back, and the festivities continued; she went to put her new journal and Mrs Lewis' gifts away, and they adjourned to the living room to watch whatever the birthday girl wanted.

As the opening credits of the new Black Widow movie rolled across the screen, they settled in, Joscelin and Luke in the loveseat, Mrs Lewis on one of the beanbags. Simon and Clary took the couch, his head in her lap and her fingers in his hair, petting him softly.

The light of the TV caught on her ring, and her pendant.

)0(

"Are you sure you don't want us at your debut?" Luke asked later that evening.

Clary snorted. "Maybe when we make it to a club you've actually heard of." She checked her hair in the hallway mirror. "Taking you somewhere like this place tonight would be just embarrassing."

Joscelin sat up in his chair. "That's not what you're wearing out, is it?"

"As it happens, yes." Clary turned her head back and forth, making her hair swish over her shoulders. The crystal necklace blazed at her throat, a full moon against her gold skin. Over her favourite black corset, a zombie unicorn reared on the back of her leather jacket, white and pink and green, and her Doc Martens were bound tight with rainbow laces. "Don't I look fabulous?"

"I'm a bit worried too many others will agree with you." Joscelin eyed her warily, taking in the ragged skinny jeans, the mis-matched earrings—a silver dagger at one earlobe, a grenade at the other, and never mind the twin emerald daith piercings. "Go put something else on, please."

"Really, dad? Really?" With a roll of her eyes, Clary spun on her heel and stalked back towards her room. She knew better than to argue with _that_ tone of voice.

She just climbed down the drainpipe instead. Much easier.

CLARRISA ADELE FRAY, GET BACK HERE her father texted four minutes later.

I MEAN IT, followed two minutes after that.

IF SOMEONE LAYS A HAND ON YOU BREAK THEIR FINGERS her phone chimed resignedly as she left the subway.

Luke was more succinct. HAVE FUN!

Clary grinned, and put her phone away inside her jacket as she spotted the club.

Pandemonium had a reputation for taking chances on new and upcoming bands, groups that were only half a step away from their parents' garages. Getting a spot on their roster didn't really mean anything, especially not on a Thursday night like tonight. A Friday set, now, or a Saturday one, that would have been something, but this wasn't as big a deal as her dad and Luke wanted to think it was.

She still felt excitement like champagne pool in her fingers as she slipped in the back way, through the door meant for maintenance and catering and ever-hopeful musicians.

Inside, she had to stop for a second. The subway had been bad, but there were more people in the club than there had been in her carriage, and the scent of over a hundred strangers packed into a tight space hit her in a wave as she breathed in: a rush of sweat and perfume and carbonated drinks, skin and deodorant and mineral-based make-up, leather and cotton and denim and sex, all mixed up in a cocktail of pubescent humanity that made her blanch. Not for the first time, she wondered if she could do this.

But then there were the boys on the stage, and any thought of turning around and leaving vanished.

Erik, Kirk, Matt and Simon were setting up, Erik helping Simon calibrate his turntables for their set. It had taken Simon and Clary almost two years of doing chores for the entire neighbourhood to afford all his DJ equipment—turntables and synthesizers were expensive—but it had been worth it; Simon was a wizard with his discs. Between her voice, his fingers, Erik's drums, Kirk's guitar and Matt's keyboard, Clary knew full well that they were going to bring the house down—if she could just deal with the stink of packed-in humanity long enough.

"Mistress Fray!" Kirk called when he spotted her, grinning as she climbed up the steps to the stage. He had rebraided his cornrows for the occasion, so that they traced graceful wave-shapes over his dark skull. "You are looking _fine_ tonight!"

Clary allowed herself a satisfied smile. "Why thank you, darling," she purred.

Kirk mimed a swoon, swaying backwards. "She called me darling!"

Matt swatted him for her.

Grinning, Clary stepped up behind Simon. "You got here okay?" she asked, resting her hand on the back of his neck. She stroked the side of his throat with her thumb absently.

He relaxed into her touch. "Yeah, Kirk gave me and the babies a lift," he called back over the music, patting the turntables fondly. He turned his head—and did a double-take as he saw her outfit up close and personal. "Woah."

Clary smirked, and bent to kiss her seated boyfriend. "And that's why I love you," she purred into his ear. "You always know how to make a girl feel special."

"It's not hard when they're as special as you," he said without missing a beat, owning the dorkiness without shame. Concern touched his gaze. "Are you okay?"

He meant about the smells. She nodded. "I can handle it!"

"Awesome!" he said loudly.

The lights sparked and sparkled, and Clary closed her eyes, imagining that she could feel the touch of the pink and blue on her skin, soft as silk and bright as jewels. They'd used to joke about her incredible sense of smell, but really, it was kind of a pain; Clary's dad had to buy expensive unscented laundry detergent and shampoo just so she could function, and even though he never complained, Clary felt bad about it. But the alternative was a permanent hay fever of watering eyes and emotional turbulence that made the worst case of PMS look like a grumpy kitten. Not that she would know: today was her seventeenth birthday, but she'd yet to experience the joys of the menses. Yet another way in which she was a freak.

The thought made her smirk. Who wanted to be normal, anyway?

She opened her eyes. "Let's give them a night to remember," she said, and Simon spun his fingers over the turntables with a laugh.

)0(

Clary didn't bother with an introduction, with talking the crowd over. When the manager gave them the nod she dropped her hand as if ordering an execution, and around her her boys snarled into life like a wolf pack, electronica magic cracking like a whip around the snapping bass. Fuck asking for the audience's attention; they _demanded_ it, throwing their song into the pit like a grenade—

"_If you're happy and you know it_

_Clap your hands like this,_

'_Caus the rest of us are wondering what on earth we missed!_

_If you're happy and you know it_

_Stomp your feet real loud!_

_The rest of could use some cheering up right now—!"_

All of Clary's concerns dissolved, sugar in water and water in wine and the music they wrought rising up around her like a tsunami, a crashing wave of sound spinning like silk through her fingers, silk and light and fire. Eric played his drums like he was fighting a war and Simon danced threads of neon lightning around them all, weaving them together with beat-beat-beats skipping and sliding and Kirk was right there with Clary, ripping at his strings like the ropes of fate and the mike was in her hand, cool metal-plastic turning hot under her fingers as she poured her soul in and watched it spill out, overflow, rip through the club like an earthquake—

"_Oh please, _

_Shoot us up with something shiny and quick!_

_We like our thrills dirt cheap,_

_And our irony thick!"_

She had them, one and all, could smell the thick tide of excitement as the band lassoed their audience's attention and dragged it to them, made it theirs. Her hair whipped around her like flames as she shrieked into the mike, ripping it from its stand and whirling across the stage, slamming her boots against the wooden slats in time with the beat. Simon was bent over his decks, spinning the discs like plates and the lights were flashing on his laptop screen, and the others were running this with her, in time, in force, a tempo to snatch at hearts and pound through Clary's veins.

"_Ohhh, this is all we know!_

_Ohhh, tragic and miserable!_

_We're not cynics, we just don't believe a word you say!_

_We're not critics, we just hate it all anyway!"_

Thrilling as a drug, adrenalin racing through every word and she was almost laughing, grinning, flashing her teeth at all the pretty boys and girls dancing to the spell of her voice.

"Sometimes I think we push your buttons… just for fun!" she sang, purring, smirking into the crowd;

"_Sometimes I think our kind of crazy has already been done…_

_We're a copy of a copy, everything we swore we'd not be,_

_Yeah the truth hurts, but it hasn't stung enough to stop me!"_

Swelling, crashing, a tidal wave of sound and Clary felt powerful, felt like a goddess, ruling the room and it was so _effortless_, so incredibly _easy!_ The lyrics just poured out of her, as easily as they had in practice, as smoothly as when she'd first written them; raw and mocking and darkly playful, making fun and making a point and it was like dancing, like flying, like leaping across the space between rooftops and knowing that your body would catch you. Because it would, because she was just that fucking good and she had the backup to prove it, the boys behind her like a legion, following their gods-damn commander to the end of the line and then building her a new gods-damn bridge, sonic fire and wild tempo and she bent into the mike and _howled—_

"_If you're happy and you know it then there might be something wrong with you!_

_What's the point in holding on when all of us don't want you to?_

_It'd make us feel better, knowing you'd be stuck forever!_

_Sick minds stick together,_

_We can stay sick forever!"_

And her boys—they tore into the chorus they knew so well and Clary snarled and sang, a dangerously fey grin flashing white teeth under the lights and her hair a forest fire, a valkyrie turned from war to song, ripping it out like a war-cry—

And before the closing chords, Clary already knew: the battle was won.

)0(

They played four more songs before their set was done, and Matt swore each was a bigger hit than the last. By the time they closed with _Pop Culture_ there were people doing their best to sing along with each chorus, jumping with their arms in the air to the lightning-bolt beats sizzling through the club.

"_Neon Myths,_ kith and kin!" Clary called as they wrapped up, grinning. She blew a kiss into the crowd with a purr. "Remember the name! You'll be seeing us again."

"Hell yeah they will!" Kirk crowed once they were outside. He slung his arm around Eric's shoulders, delight sharp and sweet on his rich umber skin. "We knocked them fucking _dead!"_

Matt and Simon heaved, and the turntables slid into the back of Kirk's van at last. The rest of the gear was already stowed away, and Kirk promised faithfully to bring it all back to his basement, their usual practice space.

"Are you surprised?" Clary asked, playfully raising her eyebrows.

"Not in the slightest," Kirk declared. "How could it be otherwise, with such a dark delight as yourself to lead us to glory?"

Clary laughed. "You're bad for my ego, Kirk." She smirked. "Never stop."

Simon moved up against her side, and Clary hooked her fingers through the loops of his jeans, tugging him closer. He leaned his cheek against her hair with a quiet sigh. "We did good."

A rush of warmth for him flooded her chest. "You did _great,"_ she told him, leaning up on tip-toe to kiss his cheek. "I'm so proud of you."

He hummed softly, her pleasure reverberating through him, flavouring his scent with a note like chocolate, sweet and blissful. Clary felt her stomach clench tight with the urge to bite into him.

"Let's stay for a bit," she said impulsively. She put her free hand on his abdomen, lightly brushing her fingertips over the thin material of his shirt. She could feel the muscles underneath, tight and trim, honed by years of Parkour and Krav Maga. He'd gotten into both because of her, so she would have someone to practice with. He was nearly as good at them as she was, now. "I want to dance with you."

He tensed under her hand, and she didn't have to ask why. He was a geek, and he knew it; being home-schooled hadn't helped. Performing was one thing—he was shielded by her, then, by the strength of her voice and the presence of the other guys. But dancing, out in a crowd where everyone could see…

"You guys coming?" Eric called, closing the van's back door.

Clary searched Simon's eyes. "No," she answered without looking away. "We're going to stay for a while."

Slowly, Simon nodded, relaxing into her desire, and the thrill of it was a physical thing, heated velvet and fireworks bursting against a dark sky; that he trusted her enough to give himself up to her will, even in something so seemingly small as this. He would leave his comfort zone for her, at her word, because he knew she would take him so far and no further, no further than he could go.

Because he was hers.

Clary smiled, and drew him down, and kissed him. "I love you," she whispered, nuzzling his lips, and when he said it back she felt it echo in her bones, embroidered in her DNA.

_Mine._

)0(

'_I want to see them look at you,'_ she told Simon, when the rest of Neon Myths were gone. _'I want them to see you and want you and realise that they can't have you. I want everyone in there to know that you're mine, and be sick with jealousy.'_

And they were. Clary could taste it in the back of her throat, the satisfying chilli-bite of frustrated lust and envy as strangers' eyes licked Simon up and down, took in the marks on his throat and her hands on him and realised he was taken. Because he was flustered and clumsy with it, not quite able to relax into the music that plucked and tugged at Clary's pulse, demanding she _move_—but he was still gorgeous. His black hair was dark as a panther's pelt, long enough to fall in his eyes and invite tangling fingers; his eyes were like milk chocolate, flecked with glints of hazel-gold half-hidden behind square glasses. He looked like another shy, innocent geek—until your eyes caught on that sweet mouth, with the hint of a wicked curl at the corners; until the definition beneath his rich brown skin became visible when he moved. Until you saw how he looked at Clary.

He was delicious, and perfect, and _hers_. And tonight she would finally have all of him.

The knowledge of it burned between them, searing so hot and bright it was all but visible. Clary was hyperaware of her own body, pressed so close to his; the soft caresses of her clothes shifting against her skin, the weight of Simon's hands on her hips, the sweat dampening her hair. The combined scents of over a hundred strangers hammered at her, but she didn't care, because Simon stared at her as if at a goddess and this teasing, this torturing of them both felt so good, so wicked and exquisite—

And then everything went red.

_Rage war threat threat thief danger!_

Clary snapped around faster than she had ever moved, blindly seeking the source of—of—of _that_, that _smell_, like an olfactory call to war; every hair on her body stood to attention and her blood came afire, hissing, lips pulled back from her teeth ready to bite, to tear, to _shred _to wet bloody pieces the threat to her place, her male, her power—

Somewhere, distantly, she could hear Simon saying her name, his hand on her arm trying to gain her attention, but Clary could see no one but the source of that enraging scent, a young woman on the other side of the club floor. She was a desert storm in a white dress, a lightning bolt with hair like a slash of ink and ochre skin, and Clary's attention snapped to her like a silver whip, unable to see-sense-hear anyone else, anything else.

It was mutual, this visceral fury; their eyes locked across the crowd, and the unreasoning, impossible rage blazing under Clary's skin jumped up to an 11, charring her veins ash-black. She snarled, even though there was no way the girl in the white dress could possibly hear her, and without thinking she dragged Simon behind her, ignoring his protests, his questions, knowing only that Simon was _hers_ and had to be protected.

Mutual. It was mutual, this inexplicable bloodthirstiness, because the other girl's face twisted in response, a wild charcoal rage that Clary understood in her marrow: _my place, my prey, my pack!_

It almost threw Clary out of her anger, that realisation: _she _was the one who had trespassed, not this stranger. Somehow, Clary had crossed some boundary, some line she hadn't known to notice. For all her rage, she was the one at fault here.

Somehow. How did she know that?

As quickly as the thought had come, Clary saw the other girl's expression smooth out, mastering the bloodlust. In its place came shock, like ice on skin, and she was still staring at Clary.

Clary tensed, her mind racing: did she stay and fight, or fly from here, and Simon with her?

Before she could decide, two more faces appeared beside the girl in white. Clary glimpsed black leather and red jewels, but she couldn't make herself look at them, couldn't force her eyes away from the girl who was somehow a threat—

Except—

Except that one, the girl the threat the rage, turned away. And. Left.

Just like that.

She vanished into the depths of the club without looking back, and Clary hesitated, not sure what it meant, not sure where the other girl was going.

"We need to go," she decided, catching Simon's hand. "Come on."

"What's wrong? Are you okay?" He didn't fight her—he never fought her, not unless it was a game, and it soothed some of the nervous-fear-anger in her; he was safe, he was still hers, nothing could be wrong if that were still true. The girl in the white dress hadn't hurt him, stolen him—

"Later," she promised, trying to calm herself down. "I'll explain later, let's just _go_—"

They were almost at the door when someone stepped out of the crowd in front of them, deliberately blocking their way, and Clary barely had time to register amber eyes and skin like firelight on gold before it hit her like a battering ram and an orgasm all wrapped up in one:

_Mine._

The world shifted, fell away. She was standing at the centre of the universe and there was only the three of them, Simon's hand in hers and this deadly-beautiful golden boy before her and she stood between them both while the stars revolved around them, jewels the size of planets dancing through space, dancing around this triad at their heart, and she knew it like gravity, like her own name—

_Mine. You're __**mine**__._

With a jolt, time started again. She was in Pandemonium once more, her feet on the earth and Simon's fingers laced tight with hers, anchoring her to reality—but reality had changed, was not the same as when she'd left it.

The stranger's gold eyes were wide and dark and she knew he felt it too, this gilded blade of a boy sheathed in black from head to toe: the sense of something locked immutably into place, a thread-rope-chain forged instantly and forever from his heart to her hand and if she pulled on it, if she wrapped it 'round her wrist and gave the softest tug he would fall like an angel at her feet, fall like a star. She could smell it on him, fir trees and sparklers and melted chocolate and he was trembling, vibrating with the echo of her heartbeat. It was written all over his face—pure _need_, overwhelming and terrible and glorious, and for her, all for her, his pupils swollen to dark eclipses and when he swallowed she knew his mouth was dry, knew his voice was gone but he was a breath away from whimpering anyway. She didn't need to look down to know he was blindingly, desperately hard; the smell of his arousal caught in her throat, thick and opiate-sweet and electrifying, and she was so wet, aching, viciously hungry to have him in her, to use him until he screamed for mercy—

_Mine. _

One glance into his eyes, and he was drowning in her; he was drowned. He was _hers_, body and soul.

She moved, beyond words, to touch him; to reach for him, to call him to her. _Mine, mine, my darling-lover-mate; come to me and be my own, my treasure…_

His eyes showed only a sliver of darkened bronze around his pupils now, and they stared at her outstretched fingers with a look of such fervent, painful longing that Clary could hardly breathe. He would take her hand, as Simon had her other; he would go to his knees and press his face to her hip, and there would be such relief in his face, a relief like tears, like homecoming—

_Yours—_

But just before his fingers could brush hers, something hard and ugly swept across his beautiful face, and he jerked away, snatching his hand back. In his other hand was a long blade of ruby glass or crystal Clary hadn't seen until now. "No!" he said sharply, loudly, anger and something like fear, like panic, staining the glory of those eyes, "I will not—I reject you, I repudiate you, I acknowledge no claim of yours—"

Simon snarled.

Snarled and _crouched_, bending as if he meant to spring at the blond and tear out his throat; he actually slipped his hand from Clary's, and his face—Clary had never seen him look like that before, couldn't see her best-loved boy in that face for a too-long moment; it was _rage_, rage and blind, animal threat, and Clary had a beat to wonder if that was how she had looked staring at the girl in white, because it looked like the same fury, the same instinctive need to do murder—

The stranger shot Simon a sharp look—one that quickly morphed into disbelief. He jerked further away from Clary, swearing, and vanished his red knife away somewhere, raising his hands so that Simon could see they were empty. "What in Sammael's name are you doing bringing a new-bonded _aatam_ here?" he said through gritted teeth. Even angry, he looked like an Egyptian prince, his golden face framed by a lion's mane of sable hair as fine as sendal; Clary itched to run her fingers through it…

It took her a moment to realise that he was talking to her, but since she didn't understand what he'd said, she ignored him. "Simon," she said, turning her body to face her boyfriend head on, "hey. Look at me."

Simon's gaze was locked on the stranger; he didn't even glance at her, and suddenly Clary had had enough. With a snarl of her own, she stepped between Simon and the other male, forcing Simon to see her. "I said _look at me,_ Simon Lewis!"

His attention snapped to her at last. He looked like an animal, something wild and untamed, and it shivered through her, the urge to master him like this. But she didn't want to put him on his knees here in the club; they were already making too much of a scene.

"That's right," she crooned. She wasn't sure he could hear her over the music pounding from the club's speakers, but he was watching her mouth, and the blank, mindless rage slowly drained from his face as she kept talking. "Calm down, dearling. It's all right. I'm here, aren't I? I'll take care of it." She stepped closer to him, curling her hand around the back of his neck. "You can relax. I've got you. I've got you."

He did, her darling, her perfect boy—he relaxed under her touch, the bowstring-tension melting from his spine as she rubbed at his neck. His shoulders slumped, and abruptly he was breathing hard, as if he'd just run a marathon. He blinked, and the manic-maniac gleam faded from his eyes. "Clary…?"

"Ssh," she murmured, wondering what had just happened, not caring enough to let it distract her from her Simon, "it's okay. You're all right."

"I—I feel really strange…"

"He shouldn't be here," the lion-prince said harshly from behind them. Her lion. Her body still burned, hungry and wet, and the snap of his voice—rude, defiant, totally unsubmissive—made her clench her teeth hard with the urge to pin him flat on the floor until he learned some manners. "Jesu, how new is your bond?"

At the sound of his voice, Simon snapped to alertness again, his eyes glazing over. His lips pulled back from his teeth, and he snarled.

"Shut up!" Clary snapped at the lion-boy, placing both her hands on Simon's chest. "This is your fault, you're the one doing this to him!"

"He shouldn't even be here!" the lion repeated angrily. He might have said more, but Clary had her hands full; Simon didn't push against her hold, but only just, his body held tense and taunt, vibrating with readiness. The moment she let her attention wander, he would spring, and she didn't have time to wonder what was wrong, what the strange guy was doing, because Simon wasn't in control of himself and he needed her, needed her to take care of him and keep him safe—

"Jace, Iyrin damn you, you were supposed to wait for me!"

A figure pushed its way out of the crowd, glaring at the lion-prince _(at _Jace_; the name dropped into Clary's chest like a gold coin into a pool)_. Clary, used to identifying people by smell, couldn't get a read on the newcomer—she couldn't even tell if Jace's friend was male or female; ze smelled like both and neither, zir scent shifting even as Clary breathed it in. Zir dark hair was pulled back into a scruffy ponytail, and ze was pretty, almost beautifully androgynous; the lines of zir face were enough like that of the girl in the white dress that Clary immediately knew they had to be related. But there was no rage-scent hanging around this person, nothing like it; if anything zir scent was…kind of relaxing, actually.

Relaxing or not, the interruption came at just the wrong moment; Clary started, and in that second Simon lunged past her. Clary snatched at his shirt but missed and it was so easy for most people to underestimate Simon, to see the shy smile and neat glasses and not look for more, but he had nearly as many Krav Maga trophies as Clary did and he could _hurt _someone—

Could hurt her Jace—

Except that Jace ducked away from the elbow Simon swung at his throat, bending backwards like a dancer, like a reed, too fast to be real.

"What are you doing?" Jace's friend asked, and Clary realised ze was speaking to _her_; staring at Clary, zir face was appalled. "Jace isn't a threat, call him off!"

Jace refused to engage, darting back and forth in the small space to get away from Simon's attacks but he wasn't trying to hit back, was clearly staying on the defensive and Clary didn't know why but she was too grateful to care, too afraid of the blank, mindless rage in Simon's face to worry about Jace's motive.

"He won't listen to me!" she told the enby. "I can't make him listen, I don't know what Jace is doing to him—"

Jace slid away from Simon's fist, swinging around and past the other boy, and as he did Clary saw his nostrils flare, thought incredulously _he can smell things like I can_ even as Jace's eyes went wide with disbelief.

"He's claimed but not bonded, Alec for Lilith's sake _help me_—"

The enby—Alec, presumably—went pale. Ze ran at Simon without another word, and Clary saw something like a crystal pen in zir left hand before ze shoved it in a pocket and darted between the two boys, holding zir hands up at Simon.

"Woah, boy, easy. Calm down."

Simon stopped before he hit zir. He snarled, dropping to a crouch, but the enby just shook zir head, spreading zir fingers. "Hey, no, none of that now. You did good, your _lilit_ is safe and sound but you're done now, you kept her safe. She's still yours."

Ze kept talking, speaking slowly and evenly as if ze were coaxing a wild horse. Clary had no idea what ze thought ze was doing until the scent coming off the enby finally reached her, and she almost gasped at the unexpectedness strangeness of it. The enby smelled like lavender and snow, an olfactory xanax; zir scent slid into Clary's lungs like incense and all her confusion and angry fear just…just melted away. Suddenly none of it seemed important; the girl in white, the impossible rage that had swept over Clary at the sight of her, the rush of need-want-_mine_ tied to the sight-scent of Jace and the fear of what was happening to Simon… It was all going to be all right, the enby's scent promised; everything was good, everything was fine…

It was working on Simon too. At first his eyes were fixed on Jace, who watched warily from behind Alec, but as the seconds passed his gaze became unfocussed, even dreamy. As if he were being drugged.

A rush of revulsion tore through Clary, waking her up like a bucket of cold water. She could still smell the perfume, but its effect was suddenly muted and dull. "What are you doing to him?" she hissed. Striding forward, she grabbed Simon's wrist and pulled him behind her, away from these strangers and their aerosol-drugs—because what else could they be, what other reason was there for her fury and her lust and Simon's sudden bloodthirstiness? "Leave him alone!"

Alec blinked at her, confused. "I'm just soothing him, Syre," ze said, bemused but formal. "What's wrong?"

"You're drugging him!" Clary snapped. "Get away from us before I call the cops!"

"The—?" If anything, Alec's confusion deepened. Ze wasn't the only one: so close to zir, Clary could taste the enby's scent, and it was…it just _was_. Every girl or woman Clary had ever met had rankled at her like an itch, while the males, except for Simon, left her cold: this Alec person did neither. Ze felt like the eye of the storm, the embodiment of serenity: just standing next to zir made Clary feel a little calmer, a little more able to think clearly. "Syre, I don't understand."

"She brought an unMarked _aatam_ to a nightclub, and you're expecting reason from her?" Jace said sarcastically.

"Be quiet!" Alec glanced apologetically at Clary. "He wasn't raised in an_ aieon_, Syre. I'm afraid he's a bit of a savage." Ze cleared zir throat. "Um, the Sundancer Aieon-Na bids you welcome, but asks that you please make your way to the city Haven. The _lilitare_—" ze pronounced it lilit-are-ray "—is hunting tonight, and will receive you as soon as she's found her prey."

Even the clarifying effect of Alec's presence couldn't make zir declaration make sense. "I have no idea what you just said," Clary said, slowly and clearly because she was obviously talking to a lunatic, "but we're leaving now. Follow us, and I really will call the police." Why hadn't anyone noticed all this going on? She didn't want to take her eyes off Alec to find out. "Come on, Simon, let's go."

Neither Alec nor Jace made any move to stop her, although Jace's eyes were hot on her, watching her walk away. She saw something painful and hungry in his face, something anguished and pleading—and then it was gone, and he looked away from her, his shoulders set and his hands curled into fists.

It took an enormous effort of will not to run to him, not to answer the plea she glimpsed in his face. But there was Simon, who was too pale and his eyes shocky and dark, and she would not risk him by staying here even a moment longer. Hardening her heart, and ignoring the howl of frustrated possessiveness ringing in her head, she led Simon away from the magically cleared space at the heart of the crowd, almost tripping over a smooth white stone on the floor as she did so.

Where the hell had that come from?

Outside, the humidity of a New York summer night slapped her in the face. They were in the back alley, she realised; she had automatically gone for the performers' entrance. Didn't matter. She turned to Simon. "Are you okay?"

"I…think so?" He blinked at her from behind his glasses, but he was still paler than she liked. "What just happened?"

"I have no idea," she said honestly. "I think maybe they had some kind of drugs in aerosol cans? I don't know what else could have done all that."

He was silent for a second. "I've never felt like that before," he said quietly. "I just… I was going to kill that guy. Really kill him. I wanted to rip him to pieces." He was shaking; Clary pulled him close and wrapped her arms around his torso. "What kind of drug does that?"

"I don't know," Clary repeated softly. She hated having to tell Simon that, hated not knowing. She was supposed to know; she was supposed to keep him safe. "Let's get home and talk to dad and Luke, okay? They'll figure out what to do."

Simon nodded shakily. "Okay." He took her hand when she offered it. "Figures we'd get the X-Files stuff the same night as our first time on stage, right?"

"Just our luck," she agreed.

They were heading towards the street when it happened again: between one blink and the next Clary's vision went red, the world washed in wet, bloody crimson, and the anger that had swept over her with the girl in white was nothing to this, a spark against the dark sun suddenly exploding in Clary's chest, so hot and blinding her very bones caught fire; her blood turned to blazing gold and the stink of sulphur snagged on her snarl, and there, right _there_, a man-shape came hurtling around the corner and down into the alley, towards Clary and Simon—

_Simon—_

This thing was not a man; it was abomination, it was evil, every cell of her body screamed out for her to wipe it off the face of the planet and _it was coming at Simon—_

Something in Clary tore open, and bright, hot gold gushed through her and out of her; she screamed, with the Morrigan's rage and the sweetest pain this world could know; and the alley was suddenly filled with light, with twin sweeping walls of white and gold light anchored in her heart—

Two walls of interwoven swords—

The man-shape skidded to a halt, its neon-blue eyes suddenly gone black as ink. There was horror in its face, and terror, and Clary exulted in it, shrieked a cry of wild triumph as she sprang towards her prey. It opened a mouth full of shark teeth to snarl defiance at her and her wings came slicing down like guillotines, blade-feathers bristling and black blood sprayed across the alley wall in a graffiti of dark oil and vengeance.

The man-shape dropped to the ground. The body was in three pieces; its head bounced a little way from the rest of the corpse, trailing that disgusting inky blood. The smell of it was enough to make Clary gag; some part of her was relieved none of it had touched her, or her—

Her _wings_—

She flexed them; it was easy. They had almost no weight, translucent sheets of light and metal that responded to her thoughts as smoothly as did her arms. The glow of them fell on the face of the girl in the white dress, standing stunned near the mouth of the alley. She must have been following the man-shape.

Clary was breathing hard. She felt warm and exhilarated, her pulse pounding in her wrists; there was laughter bubbling up her throat. The fabric of her bra rubbed against her nipples, the friction suddenly too much.

Was this what being drunk felt like?

She turned around to look at Simon; her ghostly wings slid through the brick of the alley walls as if they _(wings or walls?)_ weren't there. But Simon was there, standing where she'd left him, unmarked by blood or savage shark teeth. Satisfaction curled through Clary like velvet; she had protected him. She had kept him safe.

He smelled of lust, staring at her, his eyes almost as dark as the monster's had been, his expression a mess of helpless, adoring desire, breathless and desperate. Clary purred, pleased.

"I was trying to herd it _away _from you—" She had forgotten the other girl. Clary glanced at her, her eyes narrowing. Distantly, she was aware of the corpse dissolving into thick, foul smoke, but she didn't care about that. Her attention was laser-focussed on the stranger. She was too close to Clary's Simon.

"—And for Lilith's sake, put your wings away! Anyone could see you!" The girl paused. She stepped forward, frowning slightly; Clary saw her inhale deeply. _"Oh_, someone smells _delicious_._"_ She tilted her head, looking under Clary's outstretched wings. "Is he yours?"

Clary hissed at the interest in her voice. She snapped her wings down, blocking Simon from view. _"Mine,"_ she snarled.

"I don't smell a Mark," the other girl said lightly. Her expression hardened slightly. In the corner of Clary's eye the man-shape's corpse was dissolving into smoke, but she didn't take her attention from the other girl for an instant. The antagonism from before was building, bubbling just under the surface; it made Clary want to snap her teeth, or better yet, swipe her bladed wings at the other girl's smug face. "Who are you? What are you doing in this canton?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." And she wasn't going to give this girl her name.

"You—" The white princess dress swirled around her as the girl came closer still; Clary hissed at her again, but this time she hissed back, bristling, that raw rage rippling over her face. "Lying isn't going to save you. You—"

Suddenly she stopped. A frown settled over her elegant face, the anger replaced by a sudden confusion. "Wait…" The frown deepened; she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, and Clary knew right down to the bone that the other girl was scenting her.

_Like an animal,_ some still-rational part of her mind thought, but then the other girl's eyes snapped open, horrified.

"Adam's balls, you're unmanifested!" She sounded appalled. "What in the Watchers' names are you _doing_ here? Where's your _aieon?_" She looked past Clary at Simon. "Is he all you have with you?!"

It was all too bewildering, new terms and confusion battering at Clary's battle-hazed thoughts like hammers, like wings. She couldn't think clearly, couldn't make sense of anything, and her confusion made her angry, angrier. "Leave us _alone!" _she shouted. She snapped a wing back and curled it around Simon, using it to pull him against her. He was still mid-gasp when she grabbed him in her arms, flared both her wings, and shot up off the ground.

Simon yelped and clung to her as the ground vanished beneath them, but there was no fear-scent on his skin, only a dazed surprise. He was warm against her body, and the rush of cool air in her face cleared her mind a little, blew some of the terror-fury away like wind shredding toxic smoke; enough that she could wonder at how light he felt in her arms, enough that she could register the smell of his desire again.

She did not wonder about her wings, about her flight. She only wanted to go home. She wanted her dad and Luke to explain what was going on and make it better.

Simon nuzzled her neck as her wings beat hard, carrying them up and away. Heat shimmered about her feathers, keeping them both warm, and they streaked like a star. The fear was dissolving, and in its place exhilaration was building again, disbelieving awe and delight spinning through her ribcage like a suncatcher. Below them the city was a treasure-chest of neon gems and blazing candleflames, cars flashing over the roads like bioluminescent insects. Fluorescent billboards dazzled, and the skyscrapers looked decked out for Christmas, alight with glittering diamonds. Up here the human stink was all but gone, leaving only the incredible beauty of what mortals had built just because they could.

_This is my home. This is my city. _The thought brought with it an immense sense of pride.

Simon made a soft mewling sound, and the bolt of hunger it elicited nearly took her out of the sky. Breathing hard, Clary shook her head as she righted herself; the city might be gorgeous, but she recognised nothing from up here, and even if she had, it was dark. She didn't know how to get home, and they couldn't take the subway with wings sprouting from her back. Even New Yorkers would blink at _that_.

She picked a rooftop at random and dove, marvelling at how easy it was, at the rush of dancing with gravity. Shouldn't this be harder? Baby birds had to learn how to fly, but Clary touched down on the concrete as if she'd been doing it for years. She didn't even drop Simon.

The moment she let go of him, he dropped himself; without a word he folded to his knees, gasping, his hands flying behind his back to clasp at the base of his spine. Clary's wings glowed, shedding light across the rooftop; when Simon looked up at her she could see the glaze of need in his eyes, the flush on his cheeks. Now that the wind wasn't blowing his scent away the aroma of his desire was overwhelming, impossible to resist even as the beauty of him caught in Clary's throat, made her heart stutter.

She had thought New York by night was beautiful, but Simon—her Simon—

"Clary," he whispered, whimpered, and she groaned, closing her eyes for an instant because she had to, had to or would lose any shred of control. "Clary, please—please—" She opened her eyes to see him rock his hips, panting, the hard bulge of his arousal pressing against his jeans. Was that a wet spot darkening the denim? "I—I don't—I _need_ you, God, _please_—"

There was fear in the lust, Clary realised, swallowing hard; Simon was scared, afraid of the intensity of this need, and it eased some of the pressure on her own brain. Her sex was aching almost to the point of pain, but he was afraid.

She would take care of him.

"Ssh," she murmured, stepping closer to him; she swept her wings around him as she cupped his face, and he shuddered, his eyes rolling a little as the feathers brushed his skin. "Ssh, darling, my perfect boy. It's okay. I've got you. I've always got you." She bent her head to kiss him, biting back the urge to moan as his lips parted instantly under hers, pleading without words for more.

She gave it to him. Locked her own need away, and laid him down on one of her wings, curling the tips of her primaries around his body. "I've got you," she whispered, over and over again—as his clothes came off, as he writhed against the silkiness of her plumage, as he begged with tears in his eyes for release, for her.

She took him in her mouth, and her feathers muffled his cries, kept them only for her.

And when he was done—panting, shivering, his fever soothed—her wings wrapped around him and held him tight as they both passed out, with no one but the stars to witness.

* * *

NOTES

The song Neon Myths sing is Cynics &amp; Critics by Icon For Fire.

Kith and kin means friends and family—'kith' are friends, 'kin' are family. Among other things, it's a non-gendered way of referring to your audience, instead of saying something like 'ladies and gentlemen'.

Sammael is one of the most interesting angelic figures; the angel of death and God's right (or sometimes left) hand, Sammael is the father of demons but is unequivocally not one of the Fallen. The traditional understanding is that xe is not Fallen because God needs xem too much to kick xem out of Heaven. Xe is one of only two angels I know of that has such ambiguous/controversial standing in the celestial hierarchy.

Sendal was a thin, light silk made/used in the Middle Ages.

Iyrin is the name of the Watchers—angels sent to watch over/study humanity before the Flood—in Aramaic.

Enby is a queer term for someone who is non-binary; Clary refers to Alec this way in her thoughts because she can't figure out what gender (if any) Alec is from Alec's scent.

Syre is pronounced sire.

The Morrigan is a Celtic goddess of war and death.

Canton is an old French word literally meaning something like 'area'; in this verse the Nephilim use it to refer to territories controlled/under the dominion of different people.


	3. Chapter Two - The White Rose

Hey everyone! Yes, this is FINALLY being updated! After a lot of changes. The prologue and first chapter have both been edited and re-uploaded. If you don't want to reread them, all you really have to know is that everyone has been race-bent; that means **Clary, Simon, Joscelin, Luke, Izzy, Alec, and Jace are no longer white**. They're now of Middle Eastern descent. Also, **Alec is no longer a girl in this verse, but non-binary.**

I finally have a much stronger grasp of this world and the plot, so hopefully the next update will come faster than this one did! I hope you all enjoy it :D

(Also, the name of this fic will probably change in the near future, so don't be alarmed if the notification for the next chapter has a different title!)

* * *

**Chapter Two**  
**The White Rose**

She woke up because her chest was vibrating.

Clary blinked groggily, her dream of ruby swords and golden wings dissipating like incense in the harsh glare of sunlight, leaving behind only the faint scent of copper and ozone. Her back ached. When had her bed become so hard, and why was it so _bright_—?

She bolted upright, slapped awake by a jolt of adrenalin. Last night—the performance, the girl in the dress, Jace, monster, _wings_—

Wings that were gone now. Clary flexed her shoulders tentatively, feeling stupid, but no living rivers of light sprang from her spine. Could she have dreamed them? Or maybe they'd been a hallucination, a side-effect of whatever had turned Simon into the Hulk…? That could be possible. It even sounded likely—far more likely than…

_Than the idea that I actually flew._

She ignored the soft pang of regret that played her ribcage like a xylophone, tried not to remember how amazing it had felt to fly above the night-lit city with Simon in her arms.

_It wasn't real. It couldn't have been real._

What absolutely _was _real was that Simon was lying next to her, deeply asleep, his dreams rising from his naked skin in soft eddies of brown sugar and violets. They were on the rooftop of some random building, and judging from the position of the sun, it was mid-afternoon.

_Dad is going to kill me._

Her phone stopped vibrating, which reminded her that it had been vibrating in the first place; she swore viciously and yanked it out of her pocket. Too late; it went still in her hand.

_And Luke will hide the body._

She swiped past the screensaver _(the sweet curve of a naked hipbone; Simon's)_ and winced. Twenty-seven missed calls, and so many texts she was a little surprised her phone hadn't given up and burst into flames.

_They must be going out of their minds,_ she thought, guilt pooling like venom in her stomach as she pressed her father's contact and raised the phone to her ear, listening to it ring. _And I don't blame them one little bit…_ Nothing like this had ever happened before; she'd never given her dad and Luke any reason to worry, never stayed out late or gone drinking or…anything, really. Why would she, when she had Simon? She'd never needed anything else but her best friend-turned-boyfriend and her family.

No wonder they were freaking out.

Her phone rang and rang. Apprehension began to gather at the back of Clary's throat, barely noticeable at first, but soon it was like breathing in smoke, burning and burning. Her dad _always _picked up after the first ring.

_And he called just a second ago…_ Could he be mad at her? No, of course he was furious with her, but he wouldn't be so petty as to not answer her call. He wouldn't do that.

The call clicked to voicemail, and Clary swallowed. "Dad, it's me. I'm so sorry for not coming home—some weird stuff happened last night, but we're both safe and we'll be home soon." She made her voice calm and authoritative, as if she were talking to Simon. "Call me back when you get this." She paused. "I love you," she added, more softly.

Stomach churning, she hung up and stared at the screen of her phone, expecting to see it light up with her dad's returned call any second.

It didn't.

After a few minutes, she put the phone away, trying to ignore the growing sense of unease, and nuzzled the back of Simon's neck. "Dearling? I think you should wake up now."

A shot of lemon-citrus melted through the sleepy violets-and-sugar smell of Simon's dreams, and as she stroked her palm over his side he stirred under her hand. "Clary…?"

His skin was oily. Clary frowned and raised her hand, tilting it so the slickness on her fingers gleamed in the sunlight. _What the…? _

She wiped it off on the ground.

"Um, Clary?" Simon rolled onto his back and stared up at the sky, his eyes gone wide. "Where the hell are we?"

"On a rooftop somewhere. I think we made a run while we were high." A Parkour run, she meant, because going for a jog didn't usually end at the top of an apartment block. "How are you feeling?"

"High… Oh, shit." He sat up quickly. "You—you had _wings_, and that guy in the alley—"

"I feel confident in saying those were all hallucinations," Clary said firmly. "Those people at Pandemonium must have drugged us."

"Aerosol drugs," Simon mumbled. He put his head in his hands. "Yeah, I remember you saying that last night. Before the wings." He rubbed his forehead. "Okay, but if you tell me I did a run skyclad, I'm going back to sleep."

But since he hadn't gone running naked—Clary distinctly remembered taking off his clothes the night before—but then again, she remembered flying, so—it was an easy thing to gather his clothes from where they'd been scattered across the rooftop.

He was pulling on his shirt when Clary's phone rang again.

This time Clary grabbed it instantly, swiping the screen to answer the call and slapping it against her ear. "Dad? I'm so sorry, Simon and I'll be home soon—"

"No!" her dad said sharply, and Clary froze, because that single syllable was imbued with so much intensity and fear— "Don't come home, don't you _dare_ come home. You and Simon have to—"

A woman's scream pierced the background; Clary heard Luke's voice in the distance shout "Elaine!" Elaine was Simon's mother.

"Dad, what's going on?" Clary demanded, and saw Simon's gaze snap to her, alerted by the brittle panic in her voice. "Where are you? Was that Simon's mom?"

"What about my mom?" Simon asked, but Clary barely heard him.

"Clary, in the saved places on your Google Maps app there's a place listed as 'dry cleaning'. You take Simon and you go there as fast as you can, you don't stop for anything—" There was a crashing noise, and Joscelin grunted as if in pain. "When you get there, tell them your name is Morgenstern and your mother didn't repent. Tell them she's after the Seal. Okay? Do you have all that?"

"Dry cleaning? My _mother?_ Dad, what are you talking about, what's going on?"

"I love you, angel." Her dad's voice was thick; she thought he might be close to tears, and the thought made her want to scream, _no no this is all wrong what's happening you have to be okay! _"I love you so much. You're the best thing I've ever done." His deep, shuddering breath knifed down Clary's spine. "Don't come home."

The disconnect tone whined in Clary's ear.

"Dad? Dad, wait! _Dad!" _

"Clary, you're screaming." Simon's voice was gentle, but his fear was a haze of tea tree and hot milk, sick and tangy in her nose. It set her skin to prickling, sparks and nitro-glycerine. "What's happened?"

Clary stared at her phone. She had no name for what she felt, didn't know if it was shock or fear or anger or some hybrid born of all three. "We have to get home," she heard herself say, because there was no other decision she could make. "Right _now."_

)0(

Apartment buildings in New York tended to cluster together; some of them even stretched entire blocks. It didn't take two Parkour kids long to find their way down to ground level, switching between fire escapes and drainpipes and balconies as required, and once they hit the street there was a subway station and a train and every tick-tick-tick of the clock was a grenade in Clary's chest.

_Please please please, let dad and Luke and Mrs Lewis be okay…_

Beside her on the train, Simon stood still and quiet, clutching a pole for balance. His other arm was around Clary's waist, holding her tight. He knew only as much as she did, but it was too much, and not enough. With her ear pressed to his chest, Clary could hear his heart pounding like one of Eric's drum solos.

It took them maybe twenty minutes from the end of Joscelin's call to reach home. They hadn't been as far away as Clary had feared, but she was still terrified it was too far as she bolted from the subway with Simon right behind her. Thank all the gods she hadn't worn high heels last night; her soles slammed hard against the pavement, beating like her heart, and she almost, almost flew—

_(What she wouldn't have given for wings, now, right now, to reach home even faster—)_

Home was a big brownstone that had once been grand, but had in recent years been divided into apartments and gone a little drab; the paint on the door was peeling, and some of the windows begged for a proper scrubbing. Clary's dad said that the ivy growing across the brick was bad for it and would weaken the structure, but it was so pretty that he still came out in autumn to sit on the sidewalk and paint the rioting colours, all sunset and flames—

_(He will do it again, he's fine, he will paint for years and years and years yet—)_

But she barely saw any of it, when she finally reached the gate; not the dirty windows or the ivy just beginning to turn red. Only the front door, which had been ripped off its hinges and lay discarded next to the porch, and let loose the stench of blood from inside the house.

It was a thick copper-and-iron stench that touched the back of her throat like a finger, like fire, searing through her every cell and leaving crimson lightning in its wake. Not dead menstrual blood, not the few live drops scattered from a sliced finger in the kitchen or a knee scraped in a Parkour roll—this was overwhelming and terrible, drowning out the smell of home.

"Call the cops!" she yelled at Simon over her shoulder. She should have called 911 the second her dad hung up on her, but she didn't, and now— "And an ambulance. And _stay here."_

She used what they jokingly called her Alpha Tone to make it stick, that particular pitch and inflection that made Simon's eyes glaze over and his knees go weak; she saw him lock in place a few feet down the pavement before she pushed open the gate and walked up to the house.

Every step carried the tang of her father's blood deep into her lungs. It was like walking into a fog that only she could see; she could almost _feel_ the scent against her skin, pressing on her like something tangible, and in response something glittering and razor-edged rose up in her, something that flowed cold and terrible as mercury through her veins. Without conscious thought her lips pulled back from her teeth in a silent snarl, because the dirty skylight made the old foyer dim and dark but not enough so to hide the bloodstains soaking into the carpeted stairs; her dad's blood, and Luke's, but the smell of it was not enough to distract her from the myriad other scents that hadn't been here when she left last night—the smell of _people_, people like her and her dad and Luke and Simon _(and Jace and Alec, her mind added in a whisper)_, people who smelled real in a way that people on the street never did. There'd been men here, males like her father and Luke—four, five, six of them, each one's scent overlaid with something _else_, a sick perfume that drew a soft hiss of rage from between Clary's teeth. She _hated_ it, that smell, she wanted to track down its source and tear it apart with her bare hands—she almost did, turned away from the stairs for a half-breath fully intending to follow it out the door and wherever it led, before she caught herself. But it was hard to focus on anything else, suddenly; it screamed _intruder,_ that scent, screamed_ threat _and_ thief,_ scraping the same unreasoning fury as that girl at the club last night—

Only worse, because whoever it was had hurt her dad and Luke and she would _kill_ them, she would kill the intruder a thousand times for every drop of Joscelin and Luke's blood they'd spilled—

By the time she reached the landing she had every scent memorised; the six males _(sage violet white tea cucumber birch clove)_ and that one other, the one who was like her and Mrs Lewis, who was female and _wrong_; thick, cloying rose-scent and marzipan and salt. That one had hung back while her males did the work, had stood _here_ and watched while they ripped apart the door of Joscelin's apartment. Bits of wood and splinters were scattered across the landing; Clary's foot nudged the brass doorknob as she moved closer to her home, stepping lightly, silently.

The smell of blood was even stronger here.

She paused in the doorway, resting a hand on the door frame and straining to hear—anything. Any sign that the people who had done this were still here. Her dad's voice, or Luke's. But all she could hear was her own breathing, her own furious heartbeat.

Joscelin had always been something of a paranoid father. Clary had grown up knowing there were a dozen guns concealed around their home, and twice that many knives––her dad had given her a fake lipstick that twisted open into a vicious dagger for her twelfth birthday, then spent the next six months teaching her how to use it; every birthday since then had come with a new blade, until yesterday. No matter where you were in the apartment, there was always something sharp hidden within easy reach. She and Simon used to spend sleepovers coming up with the most outlandish explanations they could think of for Joscelin's fears; he was on the run from the Yakuza, he was ex-KGB, his family were European royalty and if they ever found him, they would drag him back to Europe to marry some inbred duchess with too many corgis…

They'd never believed any of it, but now, as Clary drew the Beretta M9 from where it was taped to the underside of the hall table, she remembered what Joscelin had said to her on the phone: _'Your mother didn't repent.'_ She remembered the stink of _other_ that was all over the apartment, and wondered if the thing Joscelin had been afraid of all these years—the reason he'd enrolled Clary in Krav Maga, the reason he'd insisted she learn Parkour, the reason he'd taken her and Simon to the gun ranges every weekend for the last four years—was because her mother wasn't dead at all.

Braced for anything—for a monster, for a mother, for them to be the same thing—Clary searched the apartment room by room, thumbing off the Beretta's safety as she went. It was as if a hurricane had blown through; chairs were overturned and broken, paintings fallen from the walls. One of the bookcases had been knocked over, its contents scattered across the floor. The mirror in the hallway was broken, the frame empty, vicious silver shards rained down to puddle beneath it. More telling still was the miasma of fear and desperation, panic and pain and rage that seemed embedded in the walls, a cocktail that at any other time would have made Clary retch, but now only made her feel colder; stagnant water and cigarette stink, valerian and pepper and yew flowers. And blood, always blood, not quite overpowering enough to drown out the rose-marzipan-salt scent that whispered _enemy_ in a language older and purer than words.

She found Mrs Lewis in the kitchen. She was lying on the floor, surrounded by a slick red lake that pooled around her body like a demonic aura; the stench of it was unbelievable, rust-raw and thick as smog. Clary didn't blink, felt nothing at the sight, just checked the corners of the room for hidden invaders and continued on until she'd cleared the entire apartment, until it was clear that there was no one else here. No strange males with blood on their hands. No Luke. No Joscelin. No rose-stinking stranger.

Only when she was sure it was safe did she hit the safety on her gun and go back to the kitchen. The stink of all that blood should have made her choke, should have had her retching and fighting not to throw up, but her gag reflex had gone out like a light and she felt nothing. She paused in the doorway and found herself staring at Mrs Lewis dispassionately, cataloguing her injuries as coolly as a coroner; something sharp had slashed deeply and repeatedly at the woman's chest, at least four or five neat-edged strikes criss-crossing the chest and torso. There might have been more, but Mrs Lewis' dress was soaked in crimson and it was difficult to evaluate the damage. They might have been from a knife—

_(Wings of living light and metal, sweeping down like guillotines—)_

Clary blinked, and realised that she was just standing here in the doorway while her boyfriend's mother bled to death on the floor.

She expected sudden panic to burst within her at the realisation; it didn't. She set the gun on the kitchen counter and found aluminium foil, tape and scissors, quickly and deftly but without any desperate need for haste driving her. Even when she knelt down beside Mrs Lewis and started cutting and folding the foil the way Luke had shown her, making sure each patch was at least two inches wider than the cuts she used them on, she felt no fear. No panic or desperation. Only a cool indifference. She did what she had to because it had to be done, but it couldn't touch her, didn't faze her, not even when she had to push her fingers into one of the wounds to establish how large it was; the slick, wet slide of blood and flesh didn't unnerve her, and the terrible smell didn't bother her. Mrs Lewis' blood was soaking into Clary's jeans and she didn't care. Her dad and Luke were gone, missing, their blood splattered on walls and drying on the stairs outside, but that, too, was suddenly distant and far away. There was only the indifferent calm, and while part of her realized that this was bizarre, the rest shrugged and got on with what needed to be done.

She was on the second-last patch when Mrs Lewis stirred. "Clary…?"

"There's an ambulance on the way," Clary said without looking at her; her blood-sticky fingers deftly folded and re-folded the foil. Simon would have called, because Clary had told him to. "I've patched most of your injuries already."

"Don' deserve it…" Mrs Lewis mumbled, slurring a little. "Tried to keep them safe… Couldn't. 'm sorry, sweetheart."

"Please don't talk," Clary said calmly, but Mrs Lewis continued to do just that as Clary finished the patch and started taping it down.

"You…have to…go…" Mrs Lewis coughed, and the motion jerked a heart-wrenching cry from her throat.

"No one is going anywhere until the ambulance gets here," Clary said. Her hands had already started on the last patch, without needing any input from her.

"…_go_," Mrs Lewis said again, more forcefully. "She'll be…back. Kill you if…she finds you. _Go!"_

Clary's hands paused. The cool haze parted briefly. "My mother?" she whispered, despite herself.

Mrs Lewis suddenly grabbed Clary's jacket, and Clary almost snarled, only biting back the sound when she saw just how weak Mrs Lewis' fist was. Her usually sepia skin was pale with blood loss. "She will take Simon," the woman forced out, through teeth gritted against what had to be unspeakable agony, "if she finds you. Don't you let her touch my boy, Clary. Don't you dare."

The ice shattered as if under a battering ram, and under it there was only _fire_, enraged and blazing. Clary did not need Mrs Lewis to say any more to know that the _she_ referred to was the one who smelled like roses and salt, who had left her stink all over Clary's territory, who had hurt and taken her father and almost-father. The _she_ that was going to _die_ _screaming_ when Clary got her hands on her.

"I'll keep him safe." It was not a promise; it was a statement. "She won't touch him."

Simon's mom sighed. "You're a good girl."

Her fingers slid limply from their grasp on Clary's jacket, and her eyes fell closed.

She was still breathing as Clary numbly finished the last patch and taped it into place, but she didn't stir, not even when Clary got up and collected the gun from the counter. Mrs Lewis' breathing was harsh and quick, which could be a sign of a sucking chest wound, but Clary had done all she could; she had to go. Even without Mrs Lewis' warning, Clary would not have been willing to linger; the roses-marzipan-salt woman, the one whose stink was all over the apartment, had taken Joscelin and Luke and almost killed Mrs Lewis, and she might come back.

If the Rose really was Clary's mother, there was a very good chance she would come back and take her daughter as she'd taken her ex-husband.

Without looking back at the woman who'd baked her birthday cake just yesterday, Clary quickly left the kitchen and threw together a go-bag. The same people who'd torn apart her home had wrecked her room, but not so badly that she couldn't find what she wanted; clothes and toiletries and pepper spray, the knife taped to the back of her headboard and the one hidden in her menstrual supplies. Beneath the false bottom of a drawer she recovered her passport, a roll of emergency cash, and a disposable cell phone. She shoved it all in a bag, changed quickly into fresh clothes, and was looking for the first aid kit in the studio when she heard a noise behind her.

She whirled, bringing the Beretta up two-handed—and froze in complete confusion as the intruder put zir hands in the air.

It was the enby from last night, Alec, and once again zir strange scent jumped out at Clary, impossibly soothing and impossibly strange. It defied definition, and Clary could no more figure out zir gender in the bright light of day than she'd been able to in the dim club the night before; ze was as androgynous physically as ze was scent-wise. Pretty, almost beautiful, actually, with dark messy hair and the same richly coloured skin as Clary's own. Ze was taller than her, _everyone _was taller than Clary, but ze couldn't have been much older; eighteen or nineteen, maybe, early twenties at the very most. In daylight zir eyes were a startling blue, bright as jewels.

"Sorry!" Alec said. "I didn't mean to startle you."

"Who are you?" Clary demanded. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I'm the Sundancer _norea_. My name is Alexandre—you can call me Alec." Ze frowned at the Beretta. "Do you think you could put the gun away, Syre? I'm not going to hurt you."

"Why," Clary repeated through gritted teeth, "are you here, Alec?"

Alec hesitated. "Well, you didn't show up at the Haven this morning," ze said apologetically. "And Izzy said that you weren't manifested yet, even though _Jace_ said you damn well were—sorry, Syre, his words, not mine—anyway, she, Izzy, sent me to come find you and escort you to the Haven."

_Jace. _Just the thought of her golden boy set a burning hunger alight in her belly, made her insides clench tight. _Mine. _But Clary pushed the desire away, focussing on the more important parts of Alec's message. "I'm not going anywhere with you," she said coldly.

Alec blinked. "But—Syre, you're in the Sundancer canton. I'm sorry, but you're going to have to explain to the Sundancer _lilitare_ what you're doing here."

"Look, if you don't want me in your stupid club then I won't go back there, all right?" Clary snapped.

"That's not what I meant." Alec rolled zir eyes as if pleading for patience from some Heavenly power. "I'm sorry, I'm not doing this right. This canton is Sundancer territory, Syre. You shouldn't be here."

"I live here!"

Alec blinked again, confused. "What?"

"I live here. I've lived here my whole life, and I'm not going to go live in, in _Moscow_ or something just because you say so!"

"Moscow belongs to the Firebirds," Alec said, even more puzzled. "Why would you go there? Are they your kin?"

She didn't have time for this. "Look, I'm going to say this one more time, because you don't seem to be getting it: I have no idea what you're talking about. I don't know you, I'm not listening to you, and I am definitely not going anywhere with you. Now _get out of my way."_

Alec didn't move, but the scent of snow and lavender began to fill the room, the same soothing, reassuring aroma that had put Simon into a drugged serenity last night. Clary fired a warning shot without hesitation.

"Try and drug me, and I will shoot you," she said coldly.

She expected Alec to scoff, but the enby grew pale. "Syre, please," ze said, even as ze stepped to one side to let Clary pass. "I'm trying to help you."

"I don't need your help!" Clary snapped. She kept the gun up and her gaze on Alec, carefully walking past zir. The drug in the air had dissipated; Clary had no idea how Alec had produced it, since she hadn't seen an aerosol can anywhere, but she was wary of Alec trying to use it again.

When she judged herself at a safe distance, she thumbed on the safety, turned, and fled the apartment.

)0(

She emerged in the sunlight serenaded by approaching police sirens, made a split-second decision, and didn't stop. Instead she grabbed Simon's wrist as she ran past, pulling him along with her.

He didn't fight her, didn't even question her. He just started running.

)0(

The moment they were out of sight of the house, Clary led Simon up onto the rooftops, leaping from a dumpster to catch a fire escape and swinging herself up onto the sky-road. She focussed on the rush of feeling her own body's power and grace, the sweet burn of physical exertion, the thrill of being young and strong and capable of what she wanted. She translated vectors and distances into jumps and rolls, vaults and flips, and thought of nothing but the pound of concrete and metal under her feet and the wind snatching at her hair.

But nobody could run forever, and Clary didn't try. When she could no longer hear the ambulance sirens, she stopped, and gestured for Simon to stop too.

He did, and watched her. He still asked no questions, but he didn't need to speak to tell her he was afraid; the scent rising from his skin was near enough to that which Joscelin and Luke and Mrs Lewis had left in Clary's apartment to sicken her.

"Down," Clary said finally—in the Alpha Voice, firm and clear and brooking no disobedience whatsoever—and Simon dropped for her. He went down on his knees there on the rooftop without hesitation, and the curve of his spine was sacred calligraphy, the peace that swept over his face as he knelt at her face a benison.

Gently, she slid her fingers into his hair and drew him closer until his cheek pressed against her thigh. Even before she touched him, the sour tang of his fear had melted into something sweeter and calmer, and now the scents of coconut and vanilla wafted up to her, a perfume she wished he could always wear.

"Your mom was at my place," she said quietly. She stroked his hair, over and over, anchoring him here and now and with her. "With my dad and Luke. Someone attacked them; that's when dad called and told me not to come home. But we went back anyway, didn't we?"

Simon hummed in agreement, almost sleepily. He'd dropped down deep, deeper than she'd meant for him to go, but maybe that was best; it would be easier for him to hear what she had to say through the haze of subspace.

"Dad and Luke were gone," she told Simon. "Your mom was there. She was very badly hurt, but I gave her first-aid. She's probably going to be in hospital for a while, but I think she's going to be okay." The police cars and ambulance had been almost on the doorstep when she and Simon left, she thought coolly. They would find Mrs Lewis very quickly.

The horror of it all still did not touch her. She kept waiting and waiting for it, but it hadn't yet come.

"Your mom said that she tried to protect my dads, but couldn't. And that whoever it was would kill me and take you if she found us. That's why we left."

Simon nodded, slowly, against her leg. Clary kept petting him.

"One of those people from Pandemonium was there. Alec. Did you see zem come in after me?"

This time Simon shook his head.

Clary considered that. She had not scented Alec in the apartment when she'd entered it, so ze must have come in after her. The brownstone had a back door that led to a small, scrubby garden; maybe Alec had come in that way. She filed it away to think about later; it didn't seem very important right now.

There were other things she had to think about later.

"Dad said there's a saved location in my phone that we should go to. So we're going to head to your house, pack you a bag, and go wherever it is my dad wanted us to go." It was not a question, or a suggestion. This was what they would do. "We're going to go very quickly, because it sounds like whoever attacked our parents is looking for us too. Do you understand?"

Simon nodded again.

Despite everything, Clary found herself smiling. Simon's faith in her was more soothing than any drug, as if simply by virtue of believing her to be capable of handling anything, he made her so. His faith in her… It was humbling that he gave her this, that he chose to give her this. Humbling—and empowering. Simon's adoration, his _worship_, worked alchemy as it roared through her veins, transmuting her mortal blood to godly ichor. When he knelt at her feet, he made her into a goddess.

"I love you so much," she told him softly. "You're so, so good for me, Si. God, I'm so proud of you." He hadn't faltered once all morning, had trusted her without question, without hesitation. He'd had every right to balk or freak out, but he hadn't, because she'd needed him not to.

He deserved so much more than he was likely to get today.

She breathed in his blissful pleasure at having pleased, felt it in the way he relaxed against her leg. The scent made her ache as she drew it deep into her lungs, a warm molten heat pooling low in her stomach. She wanted so badly to kiss him breathless. His lips would be soft and slack if she kissed him now, unresisting, too deep in the subspace to even beg…

But there was no time for that. No time, and yet as she coaxed him back to reality she went slowly. She'd long ago learned that taking him out of a drop too quickly left him shaken and sick, uneasy in his skin and mind, sometimes for days, and not even the unrelenting pressure of knowing they needed to be moving was enough to make Clary subject him to that. Instead she kept petting him, making sure she was always touching his hair or his cheek as she kept up a continuous stream of heart-felt praise. At home she would have wrapped him in blankets and cuddled him until he felt solid again, made him sandwiches or pancakes and bullied him into drinking a fruit smoothie. Here she only had what was in her go-bag to work with, but she fed him bits of energy bar and squares of milk chocolate until he blinked up at her with clear eyes.

"You ready to get up?" she asked gently, and he nodded.

She helped him to his feet and hugged him, still murmuring, stroking her palm down his spine over and over. His arms came up around her, and for a long minute they stayed like that. She let him breathe, felt him shift and settle inside himself, felt him cast his anchor between the white arcs of her ribcage.

Where it hooked and caught, as it always had—and always would.

"Good boy," Clary said again—meaning it, always meaning it. "Are you ready?"

He nodded. "Yes," he said quietly.

She pulled away a little to kiss him softly, cupping his face in her hands. "Good. Then let's go."

)0(

They travelled most of the way to Simon's house by rooftop. Like Clary's family, Simon and his mom lived in an old converted brownstone; unlike Joscelin and Luke, Mrs Lewis owned her building, renting out the other five apartments to other families. More than once she had offered to put up Clary's family in one of those very apartments, rent free. Joscelin had always smiled and politely but firmly declined, without explanation; Elaine channelled her disappointment by feeding them, bringing baked goods and pot roasts and hearty lasagnes to the Fray household at least twice a week. Clary had never understood the dynamic between Simon's mom and her dads, but she was grateful for the food. Nobody cooked like Mrs Lewis.

Clary and Simon entered through the back of the building, shimmying down a drainpipe and onto one of the flowering balconies that grew out of the back wall. Clary listened for the sound of police sirens as Simon unlocked the balcony door with his key, but she could hear nothing. Maybe they were just too far away for the sound to carry, but she thought it more likely that the cops had turned the sirens off now that they were at the scene. By now some rookie would be setting up police tape around the bloodstains and broken door, and forensics teams would have been called. Hopefully Simon's mom had already been whisked away to the sterile safety of a hospital.

Maybe they should have stayed to talk to the cops, but Clary didn't think she'd made a mistake there. They didn't know who was looking for them, didn't know if the Rose might have eyes in law enforcement. If she did, talking to the police would be like stepping into a spotlight; there would be a paper trail, and because Clary and Simon were minors without any other relatives to take care of them, they would probably get dumped in a group home for someone else to deal with. They would be sitting ducks. No, better to stay off the radar entirely until they knew what was going on.

It wasn't as if telling the police what the attackers smelled like would help their investigation any.

Once they were inside the apartment, Clary made Simon wait while she did a quick sweep, looking—and smelling—for signs that strangers had been here. But there was no blood-scent here, no rose-stink, and nothing was out of place. It seemed that the Rose had either not found or not reached Simon's home yet.

She sent Simon to pack a go-bag while she paced from room to room, watching the windows and listening for a sound at the door. Clary did not often visit Simon's home, because his mother's scent was embedded in the walls. Now she realised that what bothered her about it—made her snappish and short-tempered, as if a smell could itch—was a lesser version of what had made her ready to kill the girl in white the night before. The same _something_, but weaker, not so intense. Diluted.

Which led her to considering some of the things she'd set aside to think about later. Primarily the particular realisation which she had missed in the chaos last night but that had leapt out at her upon seeing Alec in the light of day, which was: Alec and zir friends looked like Clary and Joscelin.

It should have been impossible. Clary had never seen anyone else who looked quite like her—Simon and his mom came close, but the bones in their faces were subtly different, their skin not quite the right shade. Luke came closer still, so close he and Joscelin might have been cousins instead of lovers—but Luke was paler than Clary and her dad too, darker than Simon but not dark enough. Clary had never stopped to think about it; she had accepted her father's explanation that their family was a hodgepodge mess of ethnicities, and that was why they didn't fit neatly into any category. This was New York; she didn't know _anyone_ who defined themselves as more than an American, who didn't have parents and grandparents and great-grandparents from all over the place. She was hardly the only teenager unable to stick an easy label on their heritage.

But these strangers… The shape of their faces, the shade of their skins, their lithe builds and the liquid grace with which they moved—they were like her. They even _smelled_ like her, like real people—like Clary's dads and Simon and, to a lesser extent, his mother.

Like whoever had attacked Mrs Lewis and taken Luke and Joscelin.

Clary had known she was different for most of her life. No one else had a sense of smell like hers; Simon's research on the topic suggested that humans were physically incapable of smelling the things she could. Other girls had friends who were also girls, because they didn't have instincts that screamed that all other females were threats to be driven off with violence. Other girls had started menstruating by seventeen. And other (straight) girls might love their boyfriends, but they could appreciate the looks of more than one male, couldn't they? Whereas no male but Simon, no matter how objectively handsome, had ever sparked a flicker of sexual interest in Clary; no actor, no supermodel, no hot barista at the local Starbucks. Only Simon.

And, now, Jace. Gods and goddesses, just _thinking_ about her golden boy made molten gold pool between her legs, hot and liquid. The memory of his scent… She had to swallow hard, remembering, her mouth suddenly dry. She wanted to bury her face in his neck and breathe in the smell of him until it was nested in her lungs. She wanted to kiss him until he couldn't breathe; she wanted to _bite_ him, bite until his skin gave under her teeth and flooded her mouth with his taste—

With effort, she dragged her thoughts away from fantasy and back to reality.

The point was—the point _was_, Clary knew full well she wasn't normal. But she also knew that most people weren't, when you got right down to it, and so she'd never worried about it much.

But now there were people like her. People who looked like her, moved her like her, smelled like her. More of them had kidnapped her dads and hurt Mrs Lewis. Clary wasn't a freak of nature; she was part of a group. A group that probably included her dad and Luke and Simon and Mrs Lewis too, because they all looked and smelled varying degrees of right. And some parts of that group were now looking for her and Simon.

Her dad had known. The guns, the Parkour, the martial arts, the home-schooling—he'd known, and he'd tried to prepare her.

He'd lied to her, but he'd tried to prepare her.

She thought about that for a little while.

He had also, it seemed, prepared some kind of safe-house or bolt-hole for just this situation. Clary pulled out her phone to look at the address. She almost never used the map application on her phone, because she and Simon both had an excellent sense of direction, but there was the address, hidden in plain sight amidst the handful of other saved locations: _dry cleaning_. It was an address in East Flatbush, and Clary knew a moment of relief; a part of her had been afraid that she might have had to get herself and Simon out of the state, maybe even out of the country…

The thought struck her like a lightning bolt: maybe her dads had gotten away. Maybe, when Clary had Simon reached this place, Joscelin and Luke would be there waiting for them.

_No_. She squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to breathe. No, she couldn't think about that. She couldn't hope for that. It was so vanishingly unlikely—gods, forget everything else, her dads would never have left Mrs Lewis behind if they'd escaped!

_Unless they had no choice,_ a voice whispered in Clary's mind.

No. _No_. It might, _might_ be true, but she had to act as though it wasn't. Otherwise—

Abruptly her thoughts derailed, shuddered to a stop and then snapped down to a single, razor-sharp point. That scent…

In her pacing, she had come closer to Mrs Lewis' room than she ever had before. Normally Clary avoided it, because Mrs Lewis' natural scent, however objectively pleasant, made something in Clary bare its teeth and raise its hackles—and naturally that scent was more concentrated in Mrs' Lewis bedroom than anywhere else in Simon's home. It still was, but now that she was standing by the room's door Clary could smell something else almost hidden beneath it—something sweet and rich and familiar…

Barely aware of what she was doing, Clary opened the door and walked into the room, following the scent.

"I think I'm done, but you might want to—Clary?"

For the first time she could remember, Clary ignored Simon as she knelt down beside his mother's bed. Without hesitation she then lay down on her stomach and started pulling out the shoe boxes, books and other junk that had been stashed under the bed, discarding them on the carpet.

"What are you doing?" Simon asked from behind her. "Clary?"

"Hang on," she said distractedly. "There's something…"

She'd wriggled half-under the wrought-iron frame before she found the source of the scent, and then she had to squirm back out before she could examine it. Simon sat on the edge of the bed, watching curiously.

"I think it's for you," Clary said. She found herself holding a plain white box, long but narrow. It might have been a shoebox at one point, the kind meant for knee-high boots. Simon's name was written neatly on the lid in his mom's handwriting, and the whole thing just _exhaled_ that incredible perfume. Clary itched to open it, but instead she gestured Simon down to sit on the floor next to her and put the box in his lap.

Inside the box was another box—and immediately Clary knew why it had smelled so familiar, because the inner box looked just like the one Joscelin had given her yesterday, the elaborately engraved wooden box that had held her new necklace. This one was much larger, resting very snugly inside its shoebox shell, but it was made of the same wood and covered in the same intricate carvings as Clary's.

And it smelled just the same.

She and Simon shared a confused glance, and then, at Clary's nod, Simon lifted the second lid.

This time they both gasped.

Nestled on a bed of red silk were a pair of honest-to-Kore _vambraces_, forearm-sleeves of shining metal like something out of Dragon Age. They were shaped like six-winged angels, the sleeves formed out of the curved, sweeping wings, and the angels themselves each clasped what looked like a black opal in their hands, the gems polished smooth and nearly the size of eggs. They were lined with silk and leather, but Clary couldn't see any clasps or buckles, any way to open them and put them on. They were just solid metal.

"What the…" Simon whispered, stunned. "Are those _real?"_

"They look brand new." The vambraces gleamed like polished platinum, with no scratches or dents, and Clary didn't think anyone put jewels on armour except in fantasy novels. Which meant these weren't old historical pieces, but made recently, maybe for a movie set or Live Action Role-Playing. But Simon wasn't a LARPer, so why would his mom have a pair of these in a box with his name on it? They wouldn't have made any sense as a gift, however beautiful they were. "Did your mom ever mention these?"

"No. I'd have told you. They're _gorgeous."_ Simon picked them up for a closer look, lifting them out of the box. "They must be worth a fortune…"

Suddenly the metal vambraces rippled like quicksilver. Simon yelped and tried to drop them, but the wings—the angels' wings _opened_, all twelve of them, and _beat_ as if they were going to fly; but they didn't. Instead they leapt to Simon's forearms as if magnetised and snapped tight, the wings wrapping around his arms like platinum ribbons, fluttering and shimmering.

In less time than it took to tell it they were solid again, seamless and beautiful and impossible.

"What the _fuck?"_ Simon shook his arms, his eyes all whites. "What the—what just—Clary!" He kept shaking his arms, but the vambraces didn't budge. The exquisitely rendered feathers didn't so much as twitch. "Get them off me!"

"I don't think they're going to come off," Clary said, recovering from her surprise—at least enough to speak. "Simon, _hush_, okay, they're not hurting you, are they?"

He stopped trying to shake them off, but he stared at them, trembling violently. "N-no…but…"

"They had your name on them," Clary pointed out reasonably. A little warily, she reached out and brushed her finger along one wing, half-expecting the vambrace to leave Simon and latch onto her. But it stayed simple, solid metal, not feathery in the least. "Obviously they're meant for you."

Simon looked up and stared at her, wide-eyed. "They—you saw that, right? They moved on their own!"

"Mm." Clary bent her head closer to examine the closer vambrace. "Maybe it's some new military thing. Coded to your DNA?"

"Like… Like fingerprint-locked guns?" Simon asked hesitantly.

"Why not? They're building invisibility cloaks and prosthetic arms that can feel touch now. This isn't _that_ much weirder. Just prettier." She straightened up. The vambraces didn't _look_ like they had tech in them, but it wasn't as though Clary was an expert. For all she knew, those opals were just well-disguised computer chips or something. "Better question is: why the hell does your mom have something like this under her bed?"

Simon shrugged helplessly, but her imperturbation was smoothing away his panic faster than any reassurances could have done. For the final touch Clary curved her hand around the back of his neck, her thumb stroking circles over his pulse, and he shivered and relaxed into it.

She didn't wonder aloud why the military would want to make vambraces, which were hardly part of modern body armour. She didn't want Simon to be afraid of what the things on his arms might be able to do. She hadn't seen anything that looked like it might fire a bullet or even a laser when she'd looked, but again, it wasn't as if she knew what to look for. They were just going to have to hope that Simon didn't accidentally set them off—or better yet, that there wasn't anything _to_ set off.

First more people that looked like her and Simon. Now Joscelin and Mrs Lewis both having strange objects in almost identical boxes. What were the chances it wasn't all part of the same mystery?

_What were dad and Mrs. Lewis involved in?_

"Go find a long-sleeve shirt," she said finally. "Or a jacket. We'll cover them up."

"Okay…" Obediently, if gingerly, Simon started to get up—

And they both froze as they heard the front door open.

"Search it all." A woman's voice, cool and smooth as ice, glass, stone, reached Clary's ear. Instinct made Clary draw a breath, scenting through her mouth like a tiger, and some part of her was unsurprised to taste the stench of roses in her throat, faint but already growing stronger. Under and around it, the scents of the same males that had been at Clary's apartment. "Every inch. I want to know everywhere they could have gone."

Silently, Clary reached under her jacket. Her pulse thudded strong and steady against the inside of her wrist as heavy, adult footsteps sounded throughout the apartment, and as she drew out the Beretta she thumbed off the safety.

It all fell into place in her mind: there was no way to the roof from this room. The balcony opened onto the apartment's sitting room, but the front door was closer. Therefore, she had to get herself and Simon to that door.

Any second now, one of the Rose's males was going to appear in the doorway. But he would not be expecting a teenage markswoman.

"Stick to me like _glue,"_ she whisper-ordered, and Simon nodded, going calm, going relaxed, slipping into the easy headspace of obedience like an otter into a river.

Quickly, she touched her fingertips to his cheek, wordless praise—and when a man _(violets, he smelled like violets and ashes and dry, barren earth)_ stepped into the doorway, she shot the stranger in the chest.

She and Simon were up before he'd even fallen, the tearing _crack_ of the gunshot _(iron-graphite-nitro-glycerine scent like a slap to the brain)_ still bursting through the apartment as they burst through the doorway over the falling corpse. Simon had his pack and she had hers and there, two adult males, another coming out of Simon's bedroom, two from the kitchen, a swirl of sage and birch and tea and clove in her nose and mouth and turning towards her, a tall woman in white leather with a toxic spill of poison-white hair—

_The Rose—_

Her scent burst like a bomb in Clary's lungs and it all went red and terrible and senseless; she forgot the door, forgot the escape or the gun in her hand; it all washed away under the tsunami of mindless rage that broke upon her shore. Her lips pulled back and she snarled like an animal, seeing only the woman's dark eyes, knowing only her scent _(roses and salt)_ feeling it beat against her like fists: _foe rival enemy threat-threat-threat!_

_DESTROY._

Growls and snarls sounded around her, and they were far away, impossibly distant; dimly she heard Simon snarl back, felt his bag brush hers as he turned back-to-back with her, covering her. Clary felt a stab of pride through the crimson haze.

The woman held up her hand, quieting her males; her eyes were calm, but her hand trembled slightly. She was wearing something out of Skyrim; it was armour, plates of white leather and silvery metal overlapping like dragon scales to form a light, flexible tunic, decorated with golden scrollwork angels at the shoulders, forearms, and waist. Below the tunic were matching white trousers, similarly made up of leather and metal, and snowy combat boots with engraved silver buckles. Even her fingertips were covered by long gloves with metal scales tracing out her tendons, but the lower half of her face was hidden behind a scarf the same colour as the snow-melt hair tumbling down her back, the cloth so soaked in perfume it almost drowned out the woman's rose-scent. Only her eyes and brow were visible; eyes that were the same rich brown as Clary's, set in a face the same colour as Clary's own.

"Clarissa," the woman said. She did not remove the scarf. "I was hoping—"

Clary shot her.

Shot _at_ her, rather; in her hand-shaking fury, the shot went wide and chaos erupted, the Rose's three-four-_five_ males roaring and attacking all at once, drawing knives and swords of ruby-red crystal—

Clary spun and snatched at Simon and oh, turning her back on the woman was like tearing her heart out but she did it, did it for Simon, pulled him close and saw his face twisted, pupils blown black and his fingers curled into useless, vicious claws—

She glimpsed, for an instant, the metal coat-rack by the door twisting like taffy, the mirror on the wall cracking and crunching as its silver frame warped like a Salvador Dali painting, coins left on the table crumpling in on themselves like paper in a fire—

On her finger, the ring Simon had given her twisted, tightened—

"_Close your eyes!"_ a familiar voice shouted, and without thinking Clary ducked, pulling Simon down with her in time to see a dozen smooth pebbles tossed down on the floor around them—

And shut her eyes just as light _detonated_ through the space, blinding even through her eyelids.

Male voices cried out, and Clary breathed in the stink of shock and pain—

She jumped when a hand gripped hers, swung the gun up, but she scented Alec before her eyes were open and didn't pull the trigger. "Come on!" Alec said urgently, but Clary pulled her hand free and grabbed Simon's, first, only then following as Alec ran between the stunned and blinded men, more pebbles clutched in zir hand.

"Stop them!" the woman shouted from behind them. "Stop them—_Clarissa!"_

Clary didn't turn around, didn't look back, breathed shallow breaths to keep the scent of roses from fogging her brain. She saw Alec take something from zir belt, a little vial of something red, and smash it against the front door frame; caught the smell of blood, coppery and real, right, it smelled like the Rose and Simon's mom and most of all like the girl at Pandemonium but it didn't bring the fury back. Beside her Simon made a sound in the back of his throat, confused, shocked, hungry, and then Alec stepped aside, ushering them through, "Go, I'll follow, _go,"_ and Clary ran through the door without pause, Simon's hand tight in hers—

And ran out, not into the corridor of Simon's building, but into sunlight and grass, trees and sky and the wind on her face. She ran through the doorway and was suddenly outside, and Simon was beside her but the apartment was gone, the _building_ was gone, and when Clary spun around to look, she saw no door, no Rose, and no Alec.

They were alone.


	4. A Message to the Fans

After much consideration, I've decided that I'm no longer going to pretend _Morning Star's Heir_ is fanfiction. The world this is set in, the story and the characters, have no real resemblance to Cassandra Clare's, and haven't really from the start. So from now on I'll be posting this fic as _Iyrin's Daughter_ over on FictionPress. (I'd give you a link, but ff net doesn't allow embedded links in stories. Sorry!) You're welcome to read it there! I hope you will, if you've enjoyed it so far :)

Thank you to everyone who left such lovely reviews on this fic. You're the ones who've made me brave enough to make this decision. Thank you so much.


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